Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
Bangkok Post
Bangkok Post
Lifestyle

Hong Kong auction house puts pieces by Basquiat, Kusama up for sale

Since art has the ability to cure the spirit, Poly Auction Hong Kong will mark its 10th anniversary by hosting its inaugural Modern and Contemporary Art Evening Sale and Day Sale between July 12 and 13 at Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center.

Featuring over 150 art pieces valued at over HKD300 million (1.3 billion baht), collectors will have the opportunity to acquire masterpieces by legendary artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat, Wayne Thiebaud, Adrian Ghenie, Wu Guanzhong, Zao Wou-Ki, Chu Teh-Chun, Yayoi Kusama and Yoshitomo Nara.

"Over the past decade, we have stood side-by-side with the Asian art market and have seen steady growth in performance. With the special occasion of 10th Anniversary Auctions, the sales will offer an array of 20th to 21st century works from east to west, to further interpret the time transcending connotations in the crux of the modern and contemporary art scene, ushering Poly Auction Hong Kong into a new era," said Jamie Yu, head of Modern and Contemporary Art Department at Poly Auction Hong Kong.

Jean-Michel Basquiat's Logo. (Photos courtesy of Poly Auction Hong Kong)

The auction will present over 30 lots of various Western contemporary masterpieces such as Jean-Michel Basquiat's Untitled, which was created in 1981 and marked his signature visual symbols with the black face and the three-pointed crown as well as his unique aesthetic sensibilities after this work went unseen for more than 20 years.

Executed in 1984, Jean-Michel Basquiat's Logo perfectly illustrates his subsequent works' deconstruction and remodelling of advertisements, trademarks, symbols, comics, and texts. He creates a cigarette logo that will never be printed on a cigarette packet with a black man's visage on it. He employs infantile humour in this whimsical logo to refer to the brutal system of black slavery and the origins of the tobacco theme, as well as the reality of black labour on American South plantations.

The sale will also include a reproduction of Yayoi Kusama's "Infinity Nets (BSGK)" series from 1959. Created in 2015, this is a series of hand-painted nets in red on a bright yellow background, with repeated and continuous movements that depart from the purely monolithic layering of fine nets to outline curves of varying degrees of density, filling up the space with recklessness and implying infinite vitality to expand freely in the painting. This is a testament to her more mature aesthetic expression.

Find out more details at polyauction.com.hk/en/

Untitled by Jean-Michel Basquiat.
Yoshitomo Nara's Stars.
Yayoi Kusama's Infinity Nets.
Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
One subscription that gives you access to news from hundreds of sites
Already a member? Sign in here
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.