Wayne Thiebaud

Allan Stone Gallery, New York
Acquired by the present owner from the above

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"Common objects become strangely uncommon when removed from their context and ordinary way of being seen."

-- Wayne Thiebaud in Exh. Cat., San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Wayne Thiebaud, 1985, p. 51

Ride Ride Ride (Supermarket Horse) painted in 1961-1962, renders the image of a beloved childhood carousel horse, in a manner that is quintessentially Wayne Thiebaud.  Once coined the leading innovator of the "slice of cake" school by Time Magazine in 1962, Wayne Thiebaud's imagery is oft a resplendent oasis of confectionary mass-produced food stuff.  The present lot, a fantastic display of a cherished childhood experience, is a  direct corollary to the underlying associations of consumer society, and as such, is seminal Pop and seminal Thiebaud. The very surface of the painting reveals that although Thiebaud was greatly influenced by the generation of Pop artists, there were fundamental and paramount qualities that distinguished Thiebaud from his Pop counterparts. Whereas Pop artists were preoccupied with the pre-packaged psychological imprint of signs, symbols and imagery tantamount to the daily visual experience, Wayne Thiebaud favored the object itself.  While other Pop artists sought to render these sign-systems in a mechanical fashion and sought to eradicate the presence and nuance of the artist's hand, Wayne Thiebaud reveled in his participation of his surfaces and in his manipulation of the paint. Thiebaud's bold gestures and densely painted surfaces are a testament to his presence within his work and his deliberate deviation from the Pop norm.

In 1964, Life magazine commented that "Supermarket food is so American....gorgeously colored, bigger than life comestibles." (Mario Amaya, Pop Art...And After, New York, 1966, p. 63) It is therefore understandable that Pop Artists would be enamored of supermarket or drug store displays of food and the relevant associations. Banal objects and their surroundings were now seen through a looking glass of wonder, pleasure and fun. Pop Art mirrored consumption and everyday life, embracing the sameness and the literalness with which it is done. Wayne Thiebaud, who possessed an extraordinary ability to paint from memory, born from his formal training as an advertising art director, recalls the present subject affectionately and embellishes his resplendent horse with the confectionary palette that is his staple using the thick impasto to energize the surface texture of the background to keep the eye moving and entertained through the lushly painted surface of the void.  One could easily imagine that the source for Wayne Thiebaud's Ride Ride Ride (Supermarket Horse), is to be found in Richard Estes' pristine painting, The Candy Store, which demonstrates rows of repeated confectionary delights with a Pepsi logo just above the door entry way. The carousel horse of Ride Ride Ride (Supermarket Horse), would have been strategically placed just to the left of the door front, further enticing and advertising the sweet pleasures that lie within. Thiebaud's serial repetition of text in the present painting simulates the commercial repetition that is the glorious crux to the Pop art generation.

Ride Ride Ride (Supermarket Horse) captures Wayne Thiebaud's opulent handling of paint coupled with his simple, thick brush strokes which build each object into lush and highly tactile objects.  Thiebaud's exploration of seemingly banal subjects is spurred on by the modernist ideal that you can make art from anything.  The handling of the saddle and harness illustrate his early investigations into the primary issues of lighting and manipulation of paint.  As Thiebaud stated: "I don't make a lot of distinction between things like landscape or figure painting because to me the problems are inherently the same - lighting, color, structure, and so on." (Exh. Cat., San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Wayne Thiebaud, 1985, p. 41) Thiebaud uses his highly expressive brushwork to build structure and form, creating a highly palpable object with incredible depth of texture.  The thick impasto together with vivid tonal contrasts between object and background enliven the composition in which the carousel horse is joyously extended across the vanilla icing of the background.  Ride Ride Ride (Supermarket Horse) is a confectionary delight, frozen in time and memory for a generation to preserve and collect.