Alan Davie

Gimpel Fils, London, 1958, where acquired by Thomas Baker Slick Jr. and thence by descent

San Antonio, Texas, The McNay Art Museum, Tom Slick, International Art Collector; an Exhibition Organized by Wiliam J. Chiego and René Paul Barilleaux, 10th June - 13th September 2009, un-numbered exhibition, illustrated.

Alan Bowness (ed.), Alan Davie, Lund Humphries, London, 1967, cat. no.138, illustrated pp.113-4.

Stable board. Pin heads and holes are visible along all four edges, with further pin holes visible in isolated areas to the centre of the board, and tiny flecks of resultant loss in some places. There is a very slight sign of very minor undulation to the top right corner of the board, where the nails have come loose. There is minor surface dirt and flecks of studio detritus to the surface, visible upon very close inspection. There is a very slight frame abrasion in the upper right hand corner. There are very minor signs of very slight abrasion to isolated flecks of the raised pigment. There is a very fine craquelure to the thicker areas of white impasto towards the centre of the composition and elsewhere to the bottom right quadrant, visible upon very close inspection and a very small, isolated fleck of loss to the black globular pigment in the upper centre of the composition. There is a small pressure mark to the black pigment near the centre of the upper edge, with a corresponding old repair and fill to the board, visible upon close inspection. This excepting the work appears to be in very good, stable condition, with bold, vivid colours and areas of a thick, textured impasto in keeping with the artist's original technique. Ultraviolet light reveals some very minor signs of slight fluorescence, which appear in keeping with the nature of the materials and does not suggest retouching. Housed in a thin, metal frame. Please telephone the department on +44 (0) 207 293 6424 if you have any questions regarding the present work.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

‘I know Thomas Baker Slick, Jr., as an uncle; others knew him as a millionaire wildcatter and explorer who drilled for oil and found it, searched for the Yeti in Nepal, spied for the OSS in World War II, discovered diamonds in the Amazon Basin, developed the Brangus breed of cattle and the liftslab method of construction, established five major research institutes (the first when he was just twenty-five years old), wrote two books on world peace, and died a mysterious death at age forty-six.’ (Catherine Nixon Cooke, Tom Slick: Mystery Hunter, First Paraview, Virginia, 2005, p. ix)

Thomas Baker Slick, Jr, (1916-1962), the original owner of the present work, was a legendary philanthropist, businessman and cultural figure of San Antonio. He was a man who led an extraordinarily full life, whose interests and passions knew seemingly no bounds.

Born in Clarion Pennsylvania in 1916, Tom grew up with oil as his heritage. Slick’s father, after whom he was named, was an oil tycoon who made a historic find in the Cushing Field and who was known as ‘Lucky Tom or ‘King of the Wildcatters.’ His mother Berenice was a true frontierswoman, and would cart baby Tom from oil field to oil field alongside her husband.

Tom Jr was 14 when his father died leaving the family a $15 million dollar fortune. Not one to rest on his laurels, he studied in New Hampshire at the Philips Exeter Academy, and later graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Yale. Following his studies he went into business, and like his father very successfully drilled for oil, but he also invested in cattle and was particularly interested in experimental breeding techniques, mining, manufacturing, construction and dabbled in the airline business with his brother Earl.

From a young age he was attracted to science; at one stage he considered becoming a researcher but upon reflection felt he could do more through investment:

‘Technical progress comes in two ways: the evolutionary and the revolutionary. In the evolutionary way, new knowledge is laboriously accumulated, brick by brick, until a worthwhile accomplishment results. The revolutionary way is the way of adventurous explorer, skipping the small steps and making a radical advance, perhaps more by trial and error than by entirely logical reasoning. The evolutionary method is taking care of itself, but the revolutionaries need encouragement.’ (Tom Slick quoted in Robert Lubar, ‘Tom Slick and His,’ Fortune, July 1960, p.129).  It was with this attitude in mind that he set about setting up institutions, such as the Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research and the Southwest Research Institute

A passionate traveller and explorer of world cultures, Slick was particularly fascinated by India and he made his first of several visits to the country in 1955. It was on a trip through the Himalayan foothills that he first heard about the ‘Abominable Snowman.’ He led an expedition into the Himalayans in search of the creature in 1957, a joint venture with F. Kirk Johnson, a fellow oil man from Fort Worth. The trip to India introduced him to various gurus and awakened in him an interest in levitation, extrasensory perception and telekinesis, and he endeavoured to explore these phenomena scientifically, founding the Mind Science Foundation in 1958.

Slick’s adventurous eye linked itself well to the field of international collecting and in the early 1950s he began to amass an impressive group of works by artists such as Georgia O’Keeffe, Pablo Picasso, Isamu Noguchi and contemporary British artists such as Ben Nicholson, Barbara Hepworth, Peter Lanyon, Alan Davie and William Gear. He made a point of visiting museums and galleries whilst travelling and developed close relationships with dealers such as Peter Gimpel in London and Edith Halpert in New York. His taste was essentially modern and often weighted towards the abstract. In response to a letter from Ewing Halsell offering a Renoir, Slick declined stating ‘I am interested in art, but actually more modern art than this…’ (letter dated 18 October 1961, Tom Slick Papers, Southwest Foundation for Biomedical research, San Antonio, Texas, quoted in Tom Slick: International Art Collector (exhib.cat), The McNay, San Antonio, 2009, p.14) Following his tragic death in an airplane crash in 1962, a large part of the Slick collection was gifted to the McNay Art Museum, San Antonio in 1973, and works from his collection were exhibited there in 2009 (Ibid).