Field Notes IV, 2017. Oil and wax on canvas.
Lot 5

Yonas Gebremeskel (b. 1968)

Field Notes IV, 2017

Oil and wax on canvas

140 × 140 cm

Estimate KES 1,200,000–1,800,000

Bidding

Sold

KES 1,100,000

Hammer price. Buyer's premium of 20% and VAT on the premium are added.

How bidding works

Bids · 10

  1. KES 1,100,000 Paddle 400 In the room 21:48
  2. KES 1,000,000 Paddle 120 In the room 21:48
  3. KES 950,000 Paddle 472 In the room 21:48
  4. KES 900,000 Paddle 462 In the room 21:48
  5. KES 850,000 Paddle 124 In the room 21:48
  6. KES 800,000 Paddle 493 In the room 21:48
  7. KES 750,000 Paddle 472 In the room 21:48
  8. KES 700,000 Paddle 168 In the room 21:48
  9. KES 650,000 Paddle 104 In the room 21:48
  10. KES 600,000 Paddle 290 In the room 21:48

About the work

Some four hundred small rectangles, ruled by hand and painted in earth red, indigo and bone, cover the canvas edge to edge. Each was sealed with wax, scraped back and repainted several times, and the earlier layers show through at the edges of every cell. One of the larger works in the series, and the first of the square format.

Condition

Very good. The wax surface has a soft, even bloom, as is usual for the series.

Provenance

Private collection, Addis Ababa; acquired from the above by the present owner, 2019.

Literature

Y. Gebremeskel, Field Notes 2009–2019, Addis Ababa, 2020, illustrated.

The artist

Gebremeskel's Field Notes, begun in 2009, are grids of small hand-ruled rectangles in earth red, indigo and bone, painted in oil and sealed with wax, then scraped and repainted many times over. He describes them as maps of fields seen from a plane window. The series now runs to more than forty paintings, few of which have come to auction.

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