George J. McNeil

Desultory Disco

Auction Closed

November 15, 10:48 PM GMT

Estimate

5,000 - 7,000 USD

Lot Details

Description

The David M. Solinger Collection

George J. McNeil

1909 - 1995

Desultory Disco

signed McNeil and dated '83 (lower right); signed McNeil, titled and dated '83 (on the overlap); signed McNeil, titled and dated 1983 (on the reverse)

oil, canvas and string collage on canvas

56 by 68 in.

142.2 by 172.7 cm.

Executed in 1983.

This work is archived as no. 83.37 in the studio records archived and maintained by the Estate of George McNeil.

Gruenebaum Gallery, New York
Acquired from the above in December 1984 by the present owner

Ithaca, Cornell University, Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, The David M. Solinger Collection: Masterworks of Twentieth-Century Art, 2002-03, p. 113, illustrated in color

“The Disco Series” is among one of the greatest and most lively series pursued by the artist during the 1980s. George McNeil’s pursuit of figurative abstract comes full circle in these works, which according to studio records, began in 1981 with a painting titled “Demi-Monde Disco.” The series continue through 1987 ending with the painting “Dichotomy Disco.” Alive with a Dionysian spirit, the series emerged in response to an illegal dance club in a basement just two doors down from the artist’s studio on Waverly Avenue, Brooklyn. Beyond this, “The Disco Series” reflects the artist’s enthusiasm for the choreography of George Balanchine, appreciation of Afro-Cuban dance, and of course disco madness which he followed avidly on MTV—then in its glory days. Tina Turner and Rod Stewart are recognizable in at least two paintings. Graffiti sprayed on the studio doors motivated the use of bright and loud gestures of paint.

These paintings offer the “feeling for the free play of senate energies enabling him to transform his delight in the vision of urban life,” wrote the historian and curator Peter Selz.

— Jason Andrew for the Estate of George McNeil