Cy Twombly

Private Collection
Acquired by the present owner from the above in January 2012

This work is in very good condition overall. The top left edge of the sheet is partially deckled. There is a slight undulation to the sheet, inherent to the artist's working method. There are soft, minor creases along the lower edge and at the right corner, only visible upon close inspection. There is light evidence of foxing. The sheet is hinged verso to the matte at the corners. Framed under Plexiglas.
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.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

This elegant and yet striking work on paper relates to Twombly’s most important series of paintings. Now housed in the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao after its acquisition in 2007, the nine canvases that together form the Discourses on Commodus, were only previously exhibited twice; first at the Leo Castelli Gallery for which the present work was created, and then, more than a decade later in 1979, at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. The series is now understood as one of the most important works not only in the context of the artist's oeuvre but also within the history of Post-War art. Such is the fate of everything radical and ahead of its time, the inaugural exhibition of this seminal work at Leo Castelli Gallery was received with hesitation by an American audience that, in 1964, was still heavily focused on the potential of the future as visualized through the gloss Pop and sleekness of Minimalism. Audiences were astounded by the profound emotion and urgency of the work, offering something entirely unique in relation to the contemporary expectations of art at the time. The sense of nostalgia blended with the intimacy of the delicate scratching of Twombly’s pencil is entirely unique to his own practice. The corporeality of Twombly's working process, the visceral narrative that guides the Discourse of Commodus, and the cerebral investigation of semiotics that resulted in a visual conflation of time, medium and aesthetic, was at the time seen as an antiquated indulgence, however, has now become understood and heralded as an "awesome commentary [that] emerges as the surest grasp of a vulnerable ambivalence of the psyche and its images in reality; creativity heighted to the majesty of atrocity reveals its physiognomy nowhere more lucidly than her" (Heiner Bastian, Cy Twombly: Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings, Volume II, 1961-1965, Mosel, 1993, p. 29).