Mordecai Ardon 1896-1992

Michele Vishny, Mordechai Ardon, New York, no. 176, plate 126, illustrated

Overall good condition. Canvas is not lined. Slight surface soiling throughout. Minor dent approximately 1 inch in diameter in upper right quadrant. Under UV: Black areas of paint fluoresce.
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The depth, richness and delicate balance of the colors in this painting are typical of Ardon's work of this period. In this work, the artist demonstrates his incredible talent in transforming the landscape into a jewel-like masterpiece, with his use of vibrant colors intensifying the glowing colors of the coral reef of the Red Sea . Avram Kampf discusses Mordechai Ardon's abstracted landscape compositions as follows: "... the light of the sky and its scintillating reflections on the ground play a major role. They are all carefully crafted in the Bauhaus tradition and occupy a place somewhere between objectivity and abstraction. Although the painting seems to have originated in a perceived landcsape, it is an organic self-contained composition. Loosley-grouped, random forms in the sky are echoed by brightly-coloured rectangulat forms grouped... in the lower part of the canvas. Illusionistc pictorial depth is not abandoned; it no longer relates to traditional perspective, but is evoked by different advancing or receding colours." (Avram Kampf, Chagall to Kitaj, Jewish Experience in 20th Century Art, London, 1990, p. 155).