Tony Tuckson Paintings & Artwork for Sale | Tony Tuckson Art Value Price Guide

Sep. 19, 2024
TONY TUCKSON, (1921 - 1973), TD1344 (Man with Big Mouth) c1950s, watercolour on paper, 38 x 25 cm. (14.9 x 9.8 in.), frame: 62 x 48 x 3 cm. (24.4 x 18.9 x 1.1 in.)
Est: $3,000 - $5,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921 - 1973) TD1344 (Man with Big Mouth) c1950s watercolour on paper unsigned, Watters Gallery label verso, cat no. 95/21/029
Lawsons
Aug. 28, 2024
TONY TUCKSON, UNTITLED, C.1962
Est: $60,000 - $80,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921 - 1973) UNTITLED, c.1962 synthetic polymer paint on composition board 121.0 x 121.0 cm bears inscription on frame verso: T. TUCKSON / CAT 9. PROVENANCE Estate of Tony Tuckson, Sydney Watters Gallery, Sydney Fred and Carol Storch, Sydney, acquired from the above in 1979 Art Galleries Schubert, Queensland (label attached verso) Private collection, Brisbane, acquired from the above in 2002 Sotheby,s, Sydney, 24 November 2015, lot 50 John Barnes, Melbourne, acquired from the above The Estate of John Barnes, Melbourne EXHIBITED Tuckson ’62 – ’65, Watters Gallery, Sydney, 27 August – 13 September 1975, cat. 9 ESSAY Widely regarded as one of the finest abstract artists of his generation, Tony Tuckson held only two solo exhibitions during his lifetime. Following the second at Watters Gallery, Sydney – and his premature death – in 1973, Sandra McGrath wrote in Art and Australia that ‘[he] was recognised almost overnight for what he was – the best Action Painter in Australia and one of the country’s most important artists.’1 Born to British parents, Tuckson had studied art in England from 1937 – 40 and after the Second World War, at the East Sydney Technical College, including what he described as his most influential lessons with pioneering abstract artists Grace Crowley and Ralph Balson. By the time of the 1973 exhibition he had been painting for more than thirty years, but few apart from a handful of intimates had ever seen his work.2 The reason for this was the conflict he rightly perceived between his art practice and his professional role at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, where he worked from 1950 until 1973, as assistant director and then deputy to Hal Missingham. Although he worked in isolation, Tuckson was deeply immersed in the world of art and his role at the Gallery exposed him to a wide range of creative influences. Links with contemporary abstraction, and especially the work of American abstract expressionists, are clear. Tuckson established the Gallery’s Aboriginal and Melanesian art collections and his deep knowledge of Indigenous Australian art was another influence which, according to his wife Margaret, ‘first interested him for its casual way of filling an area, the lack of worry about shapes spilling over outlines.’3 Untitled, c.1962, is part of Tuckson’s second series of abstracts, a group of paintings made during the first half of the 1960s, which are distinguished by a bold palette restricted to three colours – namely red, black and white. Applied with a broad brush, blocks of colour reverberate against one another, as loose linear forms and dots of paint punctuate the open fields of colour. In this and related works, including Large shapes, red black, c.1961 (National Gallery of Australia), the gestural freedom of Tuckson’s intuitive style and his belief that ‘when you start worrying about the position of a mark, you cease to paint’4, are on clear display. Something of Tuckson’s process is also visible in this work, the dribbles of red and black paint (especially in the bottom half of the panel) which point to the immediacy of his approach, and the layers that reveal the ‘incessant activity of concealment, correction and accumulation’ of his painting, creating both visual and physical texture.5 Reviewing Tuckson’s 1973 exhibition, James Gleeson wrote, ‘What he is on about is the act of painting. His pictures are about what it feels like to paint a picture’.6 This interpretation, and its emphasis on the significance for Tuckson of the physical act of painting itself, is echoed by the eloquent words of another abstract artist, Aida Tomescu who has recently written, ‘Tuckson’s paintings transcend being pinned down to one meaning, one subject. What is being expressed here is painting itself; its capacity to be about everything at once, its subjects and meanings always multiple.’7 1. McGrath, S., ‘Tony Tuckson’, Art and Australia, Sydney, vol. 12, no. 2, 1974, p. 156 2. Tuckson occasionally submitted works to group exhibitions during the 1950s but had stopped exhibiting by the 1960s, by which time his responsibilities and public profile at the AGNSW had increased. The decision to exhibit publicly in 1970 and 1973 coincided with a scaling back of curatorial responsibilities, apart from his work with the Aboriginal and Melanesian art collections: see Mimmocchi, D., ‘Tony Tuckson: The Art of Transformation’ in Mimmocchi, D. (ed.), Tony Tuckson, exhibition catalogue, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 2018, p. 20 3. Margaret Tuckson cited in Thomas, D., Free, R. and Legge, G., Tony Tuckson, Craftsman House, Sydney, 1989, p. 39 4. Tony Tuckson cited in McGrath, op. cit., p. 156 5. See Mimmocchi, op. cit., pp. 42 – 45 6. Gleeson, J., ‘The travail of painting’, Sun-Herald, Sydney, 22 April 1973 7. Tomescu, A., ‘Fluid Construction’ in Mimmocchi, op. cit., p. 77 KIRSTY GRANT © Tony Tuckson/Copyright Agency, 2024
Deutscher and Hackett
Aug. 27, 2024
Tony Tuckson, (1921-1973), TD5446, c. 1956, gouache on paper, 27.5 x 37.5 cm
Est: $2,500 - $3,500
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) TD5446, c. 1956 gouache on paper
Shapiro Auctioneers
Aug. 27, 2024
Tony Tuckson, (1921-1973), TD 423, 1957, gouache on paper, 39 x 56 cm
Est: $3,000 - $5,000
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) TD 423, 1957 gouache on paper
Shapiro Auctioneers
Aug. 26, 2024
Tony Tuckson, Australia (1921-1973), TD 9969, 1949-56, Pencil on paper
Est: $1,200 - $1,400
Tony Tuckson Australia (1921-1973) TD 9969, 1949-56 Pencil on paper Tuckson Estate 18/88/088, Watters Gallery,27 November 2018, label verso, Original invoice
Theodore Bruce Auctioneers & Valuers
Jun. 26, 2024
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973), Seated Nude (TP127) c1952
Est: $50,000 - $70,000
PROPERTY FORMERLY FROM THE COLLECTION OF THE MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART, BRISBANE TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973) Seated Nude (TP127) c1952 oil on canvas 172.5 x 111.0 cm; 177.5 x 116.0 cm (framed) label attached to stretcher verso with catalogue description
Menzies
May. 21, 2024
Tony Tuckson, (1921-1973), Kitchen Table-top (Td 8496), pencil on paper, 14.5 x 10 cm
Est: $700 - $900
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) Kitchen Table-top (Td 8496) pencil on paper
Shapiro Auctioneers
Apr. 24, 2024
TONY TUCKSON, BLUE VERTICAL ON WHITE AND YELLOW, 1971
Est: $80,000 - $120,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921 - 1973) BLUE VERTICAL ON WHITE AND YELLOW, 1971 synthetic polymer paint on composition board 213.5 x 122.0 cm PROVENANCE Private collection, Sydney, a gift from the artist in 1972 ESSAY With Tony Tuckson’s first solo exhibition held in 1970, he was immediately placed in an inimitable position in modern Australian painting. Critical reaction to this exhibition and another in 1973 singled him out as an abstract painter of rare distinction – large expressive works of sublime grandeur. It was also the year of his premature death, age 52. Tuckson’s formative interest in Modernism was figurative, with European modernism – especially the School of Paris – shaping his approach. He had studied art in his native England (he was born in Egypt), flew Spitfires in WWII and was sent to Darwin in 1942. After the war he attended East Sydney Technical College where Grace Crowley and Ralph Balson taught, and each played an important role in further developing Tuckson’s outlook on modern painting. In 1950 Tuckson was appointed to the staff of the Art Gallery of New South Wales, becoming its deputy director in 1957. He developed a keen and deep appreciation of Aboriginal and Melanesian art, and this not only shaped the Gallery’s collection, but also informed his own art. An echo of Ian Fairweather’s approach to painting is one discreet and recurring presence in Tuckson’s work. It is not stylistic, but rather an attitude to painting itself – a philosophy about making art. And they each shared an enduring interest in Aboriginal art and the culture which created it. Marks, gestures, lineal designs across cultures – and the meanings they hold – became critical to Tuckson’s intellectual temperament. American Abstract expressionism in particular can be regarded as a decisive underpinning in the final paintings and drawings, with Tuckson encountering the movement during a study trip in 1967 – 68. Great post-war abstractionists abounded in New York. In the work of artists such as de Kooning, Newman, Rothko, Pollock, Motherwell and Twombly, Tuckson saw the conceptual and emotional possibilities inherent in abstraction. In Blue Vertical on White and Yellow, 1971 we might be tempted to look for something observed in the central blue arrangement, but that would be a distraction. Literalism was Tuckson’s anathema. The blue fluid-brushed, translucent calligraphic sweeps and the accents of yellow reach across white scumbling underpainting. Painterly incidents, dribbles and the shifts in underpainting serve as a veil for the overpainting. The blue becomes an ensemble of simple gestures and avoids any distractions of ‘finish.’ Hardboard especially was a common support for Tuckson, a surface plane with no resistance, something able to accommodate the physical immediacy in creating each work. All Tuckson’s final paintings began with forethought, but the process itself shaped their ultimate character. None suggests any sort of metaphor or understated symbolism, and titles to suggest anything beyond a pictorial description are rare. When a family friend visited Tuckson, his studio window was open, a breeze parting the curtains offering glimpses to bushland that surround his Wahroonga home. She asked about the meaning of a painting: ‘It’s about this’, Tuckson said, fixated on the motion of the curtains, and then, with a surging gesture, he emphasised, ‘and everything out there.’1 1.Mimmocchi, D., et al., Tony Tuckson, Art Gallery New South Wales, Sydney, 2018, p.18 DOUG HALL AM © Tony Tuckson/Copyright Agency 2024
Deutscher and Hackett
Mar. 27, 2024
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973), Untitled Drawing #10 (Black and White Lattice)
Est: $6,000 - $8,000
PROPERTY FROM THE ESTATE OF MR RODNEY MENZIES, MELBOURNE TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973) Untitled Drawing #10 (Black and White Lattice) gouache on paper 76.5 x 101.5 cm; 110.0 x 133.0 cm (framed)
Menzies
Feb. 13, 2024
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973), Untitled - TD 1957
Est: $2,000 - $4,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973) Untitled - TD 1957 oil wash on paper 76.5 x 51cm PROVENANCE Watters Gallery, Sydney Jan Courtin and Marshall Harris Collection © Tony Tuckson/Copyright Agency, 2024
Gibson's
Nov. 29, 2023
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973), Still Life on Black Paper
Est: $4,500 - $5,500
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973) Still Life on Black Paper gouache on card 31.5 x 51.0 cm; 59.5 x 78.5 cm (framed)
Menzies
Nov. 29, 2023
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973), TP612 1953
Est: $40,000 - $60,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973) TP612 1953 oil and pencil on board 100.0 x 70.0 cm; 103.5 x 73.0 cm (framed) signed and dated lower centre: Tuckson/ 53 bears inscription verso: cat. no. 9 TP612
Menzies
Nov. 28, 2023
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) Untitled (TP484), c.1959
Est: $20,000 - $30,000
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) Untitled (TP484), c.1959 oil on pulp board 64.0 x 76.0cm (25 3/16 x 29 15/16in).
Bonhams
Nov. 28, 2023
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) Untitled Still Life (TP421), c.1948
Est: $10,000 - $15,000
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) Untitled Still Life (TP421), c.1948 oil on canvas 56.5 x 76.0cm (22 1/4 x 29 15/16in).
Bonhams
Nov. 22, 2023
TONY TUCKSON, TWO FAINT LINES ON BROWN (TP85), 1970 – 73
Est: $150,000 - $200,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921 - 1973) TWO FAINT LINES ON BROWN (TP85), 1970 – 73 synthetic polymer paint on composition board 213.5 x 122.0 cm PROVENANCE Private collection, Sydney, a gift from the artist in 1973 EXHIBITED Tony Tuckson, Watters Gallery, Sydney, 11 April – 5 May 1973, cat. 20 Tony Tuckson 1921 – 1973, a Memorial Exhibition, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 10 April – 9 May 1976, cat. 87 (label attached verso) Two Centuries of Australian Painting, Orange Regional Gallery, New South Wales, 19 April – 15 June 1986 Tuckson: The Abstract Sublime, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 1 November 2018 – 17 February 2019 LITERATURE Thomas, D., Legge, G., & Free, R., Tony Tuckson, Craftsman House, Sydney, 1989, pl. 147 (illus.), p. 126 Mimmocchi, D., Tony Tuckson: The Abstract Sublime, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 2018, pp. 52, 71, 140 (illus.), 208 ESSAY If Tony Tuckson had failed to produce his final late abstractions, he would be admired as an inspired Modernist where the figure predominated. Paintings which were created with an interest in the School of Paris, Picasso and Matisse in particular. In 1948 he studied under Grace Crowley and Ralph Balson at East Sydney Technical College where his instinctive curiosity responded to their theories on colour and abstraction. A year later he saw the exhibition ‘ Arnhem Land Art’ at David Jones Gallery, Sydney. These moments preceded his interest in New York School lyrical abstraction, yet they appear to share a defining prescience in the making of Two faint lines on brown, 1970. It is the perfect synthesis, a sublime culmination of his unique abstraction, where in the year it was painted and exhibited at Watters Gallery, Sydney, the paintings attracted immediate and unreserved critical acclaim which has never diminished. Accounts of Tuckson’s professional role at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, his perceived conflict as a practising artist and working duties, is well recorded. He chose not to exhibit, nonetheless his private and prolific studio activity continued. His role in defining the place of Indigenous art in the AGNSW’s displays and collections was transformative. He hoped to narrow his role there and oversee Aboriginal art and his ever-developing interest in Oceanic and Melanesian art. Two faint lines on brown, 1970 is a transcendent marker of Tuckson’s vast interests, where nothing becomes a stylistic prompt and his impulsive expression reaches its most individual and resolute form. Other major works from this time include the celebrated double-panel works, where the composition of vertical lines is complemented by sweeping horizonal gestures. Aside from the wonderful overall sgraffito painterliness, two other factors are always in play in Tuckson’s late work – scale itself and surface edges – our physical relationship to his painterly monumentalism is an important dynamic. In Two faint lines on brown the chalky dry surface is subtle, rich in nuance and evocative of two interests central to Tuckson’s artistic and cultural preoccupations. The New York School (whose work he experienced when he visited in 1967 – 68), and by this stage, his two-decades long association with Aboriginal art (he had visited Yirrkala in the late 1950s). While pictorial literalism is something Tuckson avoided, it is not a stretch to connect these interests. Intuitive influences were never stylistic grabs, rather the result of art and cultures seen and experienced from personal encounters. ‘‘Contact between two cultures may not be reciprocal’ he stated, ‘but it can have considerable influence.’ This may well have been a statement in relation to his own painting…’’1 Tuckson admired the work of Barnett Newman whose so-called ‘zip’ paintings were often vast canvases that were larger in scale and reach than most viewers themselves. It is no coincidence that Newman was keenly interested in, and even curated an exhibition on, the native art of Northwestern America. The irregular falling vertical lines in our work cascade to an ensemble of lyrical, splashed and dribbled gestures at the base at its lowest edge. Whether we see it as coincidence or a discreet gesture of respect, the association with the narrow, vertical eastern Arnhem Land Mokuy figure seems inescapable. Tuckson first visited Yirrkala and Melville Island in the late 1950s. Two faint lines on brown is a sophisticated masterpiece – an encapsulation of what immediately defined his reputation as an abstractionist at the forefront of Australian painting from the moment his final works were seen. 1. The artist, cited in Mimmocchi, D. et al., Tony Tuckson, Art Gallery New South Wales, Sydney, 2018, p. 20 DOUG HALL AM © Tony Tuckson/Copyright Agency 2023
Deutscher and Hackett
Oct. 08, 2023
TUCKSON Tony (1921-1973), Kitchen Table-top (TD 8496), Pencil, 14.5x10cm
Est: $500 - $800
TUCKSON, Tony (1921-1973) Kitchen Table-top (TD 8496) Unsigned, but with inventory label verso. Pencil 14.5x10cm
Davidson Auctions
Aug. 20, 2023
TUCKSON Tony (1921-1973), Christmas Card, c.1955., Pencil & Gouache, 10.5x15cm
Est: $400 - $600
TUCKSON, Tony (1921-1973) Christmas Card, c.1955. Pencil & Gouache 10.5x15cm PROVENANCE: Gift from Margaret Tuckson, late 1980s; Davidson Auctions 21st Aug 2022 (lot 174); private collection.
Davidson Auctions
Aug. 16, 2023
TONY TUCKSON, COCKTAILS FOR TWO NO.1 (TP 160), 1947 - 49
Est: $20,000 - $30,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921 - 1973) COCKTAILS FOR TWO NO.1 (TP 160), 1947 - 49 oil on hessian 60.5 x 71.0 cm PROVENANCE Estate of the artist, Sydney Watters Gallery, Sydney Private collection, Sydney, acquired from the above in 1986 EXHIBITED Tony Tuckson: Twenty Paintings on Canvas 1947? – 1957?, Watters Gallery, Sydney, 1 – 18 October 1986, cat. 7 LITERATURE Thomas, D., Free, R. and Legge, G., Tony Tuckson, Craftsman House, Sydney, 1989, pl. 13, pp. 48 (illus.), 179 © Tony Tuckson/Copyright Agency 2023
Deutscher and Hackett
Aug. 16, 2023
TONY TUCKSON, UNTITLED NO. 100 (TP209B), 1973
Est: $180,000 - $240,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921 - 1973) UNTITLED NO. 100 (TP209B), 1973 synthetic polymer paint on composition board 213.5 x 122.0 cm PROVENANCE Estate of the artist, Sydney Watters Gallery, Sydney Private collection, Sydney EXHIBITED Tony Tuckson 1921 – 1973: a memorial exhibition, Pinacotheca, Melbourne, 13 – 30 October 1982, cat. 100 (illus. in exhibition catalogue, p. 53) 37 Artists 37 Works, Watters Gallery, Sydney, 1 – 11 October 1986 TUCKSON/TOMESCU, Liverpool Street Gallery, Sydney, 28 November 2009 – 14 January 2010 (illus. in exhibition catalogue as ‘1982 No. 100’) Great Australian Painting, Liverpool Street Gallery, Sydney, 20 August – 1 October 2022 LITERATURE Thomas, D., Free, R. and Legge, G., Tony Tuckson, Craftsman House, Sydney, 1989, pl. 160, pp. 137 (illus.), 186 ESSAY Australian art history often holds to a somewhat unreliable habit – identifying the moment an artist secured critical acclaim, then seeing the work that preceded it as a preamble and what followed as, usually, a worthy maturing postscript. This does not work with Tony Tuckson; rather we tend to view his career in reverse. Untitled No. 100, 1973 is a perfect example of this. When Tuckson first exhibited in 1970, the art world was astonished. We looked backwards, discovering how this extraordinary talent came to produce work which placed him immediately at the forefront of Australian abstraction. Tuckson worked privately and was never pressed to exhibit. At the time he had no idea what anyone thought of his art. He was a prolific weekend painter keeping a professional distance from his role as deputy director of the Art Gallery of New South Wales, where his major interest in Aboriginal and Melanesian art was not shared by trustees.1 There are important characteristics which mark Untitled No. 100 as holding a significant place amongst Tuckson’s final works. He had two exhibitions at Watters Gallery, Sydney, the last in 1973 – the year of his premature death – and the very few late works of such scale are now in public collections.2 These are invariably double-panelled works of layered paint and brushed sgraffito effects where bold, painterly calligraphic sweeps complete an irrepressible expressive wholeness. Hardboard, especially commercial Masonite, was a common support, a surface plane with no resistance, something able to accommodate the physical immediacy in creating each work. The artifice of making art – its façade – was Tuckson’s anathema. Tuckson’s work from his final decade never suggests any sort of narrative, direct metaphor or muted symbolism. Amongst the impulsiveness we still find a particular measure, gestures of considered determination. Characteristics in the late master work White on Black 1970 – 73 (Art Gallery of Ballarat) also appear in Untitled No. 100; the large vertical format, exposed unprimed Masonite surface and edge-to-edge painterly gestures are a shared feature, yet in our work the differences enter another realm. Untitled No. 100 abandons restraint. Tuckson seldom spoke openly about his art, and he enjoyed the ambiguity that might be assumed from what he said. It can be an unsafe prospect to read unspoken personal circumstances into an artist’s work, however, in this work the sense of unfettered liberation – a release from all measure and constraint – seems inescapable. Nonetheless it is not reckless nor unwieldy. The overall effect is quite unlike anything in Australian art from the early seventies, but there are discreet yet pointed elements that tie the painterly exuberance to the scale and surface personality of the work. Gestures reach to the edge of the picture plane and give cohesion to the whole; on some occasions single strokes begin at the edge and hold the single-colour orchestrated energy in its precarious urgent poise. Tuckson was an intuitive expressionist, and it is not a contradiction to say that he painted with a deep understanding of ideas and their potential for his work, borne from experiences with various cultures and a knowledge of the history of art. One might try to discern influences, connections with other artists or cultural associations, but these don’t last the more one becomes absorbed in his work. Tuckson’s work is an essential part of modern Australian art history and he seemingly never slips from view as the recent exhibition, SYNERGY: Tony Tuckson – drawing into painting, eloquently reveals.3 1. See Mendelssohn, J., Passion and Beauty: the paintings of Tony Tuckson; The Conversation at https://theconversation.com/passion-and-beauty-the-paintings-of-tony-tuckson-107591 (accessed June 2023) which includes an account of Tuckson’s role at AGNSW. 2. White lines (vertical) on ultramarine, 1970 – 73 (Art Gallery New South Wales, Sydney); Pink with charcoal lines, 1973 (Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide); Pink lines (vertical) on red and purple 1970 – 73 (Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane); Yellow, 1970 – 73 (National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne) and Pink with Charcoal Lines, 1973 (Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide). 3. SYNERGY: Tony Tuckson – drawing into painting, Drill Hall Gallery, The Australian National University, Canberra, 21 April – 18 June 2023. DOUG HALL AM © Tony Tuckson/Copyright Agency 2023
Deutscher and Hackett
Jun. 28, 2023
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973), Untitled (TP272) 1952-56
Est: $10,000 - $15,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973) Untitled (TP272) 1952-56 oil on canvas 61.0 x 45.5 cm bears inscription on stretcher verso: Watters No 4.
Menzies
May. 23, 2023
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973)
Est: $1,000 - $1,500
TD10740, 1951-52 gouache on card
Shapiro Auctioneers
May. 23, 2023
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973)
Est: $1,500 - $2,500
TD2125, 1950-52 gouache on paper
Shapiro Auctioneers
May. 23, 2023
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973)
Est: $10,000 - $15,000
TP304a, 1952-56 oil on canvas
Shapiro Auctioneers
May. 03, 2023
TONY TUCKSON, MAN’S HEAD NO. 2 (TP330), C.1952 – 56
Est: $8,000 - $12,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921 - 1973) MAN’S HEAD NO. 2 (TP330), c.1952 – 56 oil on canvas 41.0 x 37.0 cm (irregular) PROVENANCE Estate of the artist, Sydney Watters Gallery, Sydney Private collection, Melbourne, acquired from the above in 1995 EXHIBITED Tony Tuckson…heads, Watters Gallery, Sydney, 6 – 23 September 1995, cat. 18 (illus. in exhibition catalogue) © Tony Tuckson/Copyright Agency 2023
Deutscher and Hackett
May. 03, 2023
TONY TUCKSON, TP 174A UNTITLED, C.1963
Est: $60,000 - $80,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921 - 1973) TP 174A UNTITLED, c.1963 synthetic polymer paint on composition board 122.0 x 91.5 cm PROVENANCE Estate of the artist, Sydney Watters Gallery, Sydney (labels attached verso) Private collection, Sydney, acquired from the above in 2006 EXHIBITED Tony Tuckson, Paintings, Pinacotheca, Melbourne, 18 October – 4 November 1989, cat. 10 (illus. in exhibition catalogue, dated as c.1962 – 1965) Tony Tuckson. Important Paintings, Watters Gallery, Sydney, 23 August – 16 September 2006, cat. 10 (illus. in exhibition catalogue, dated as c.1963) ESSAY When Tony Tuckson held his first commercial exhibition at Watters Gallery, Sydney, in 1970 at the age of 49, it was to reveal an astonishing original painter, one who stamped an immediate and lasting mark on modern Australian art. At the time Untitled, 1963 was painted, very few knew of Tuckson’s work. His was a career happening in the shadow of strident division between abstraction and figuration. The Sydney 9 group formed in 1960 and all were abstractionists and included Robert Klippel and Clement Meadmore amongst others. It was an immediate response to Melbourne’s Antipodeans and their exhibition – all seven artists were figurative. Robert Hughes championed the former; Bernard Smith the latter.1 By 1960, John Passmore’s paintings had evolved into abstraction, and Peter Upward painted his wildly energetic June celebration in 1960. Ian Fairweather had painted abstract works in the late 50s and Monastery was finally completed in 1961 – the same year John Olsen painted You Beaut Country No. 2. Contemporaneous accounts reveal Tuckson is missing amongst all the action. Tuckson’s place in art history’s canon of great abstractionists is one written in hindsight, where respected critical reaction frequently places him as Australia’s finest abstract expressionist. Prolific weekend and evening studio activity were kept at arm’s length from his position as deputy director of the Art Gallery of New South Wales. However, his self-imposed studio isolation didn’t restrict his worldliness and the reach of his curiosity. Tuckson had studied art in his native England (he was born in Egypt), flew Spitfires in WWII and was sent to Darwin in 1942; at the end of the war he enrolled at East Sydney Technical College. As Deputy Director, he developed a keen and conversant interest in Aboriginal and Melanesian art, something not shared by uninterested gallery trustees, but it informed his own art. Tuckson’s distinctive figurative work was shaped by European modernism, especially the School of Paris, and Picasso and Matisse in particular. He also reveals an indebtedness to Ian Fairweather, both in terms of the arrangement of elements within compositions and an easy-going disregard for the quality of materials themselves. By the end of the 50s, figuration had been abandoned and the expressive potential of abstraction became a tour de force. While American Abstract Expressionism can be regarded as a pivotal underpinning of his approach to painting and drawing, Aboriginal and Melanesian art also shaped his essential aesthetic and stylistic repertoire.2 Tuckson looked at, thought about and absorbed art that interested him. Viewers won’t find revelatory moments of identifying a source and then the application of an assumed influence. His discursive interests become rather a sophisticated part of his intellectual character, discrete elements within his unrestrained intuition and expressive exuberance. Between 1961 and 1965 Tuckson worked on red, black and white paintings. Untitled suggests nothing beyond the gestures themselves in their orchestrated, well-practiced and seemingly haphazard characteristic. But the various marks, incidents and painterly sweeps all converge into an experiential whole, where no part of the painting might exist without its interconnected counterpoint.3 If Tuckson produced no further work after these formative abstractions, his reputation would be undiminished. But he continued to paint ambitiously, often larger in scale, until his premature death in 1973. 1. Antipodeans, Victorian Artists’ Society Galleries, East Melbourne; 4 – 15 August 1959 ( The Antipodean Manifesto written by Bernard Smith) 2. Mendelssohn, J., Passion and Beauty: the paintings of Tony Tuckson; The Conversation, 28 November 2018 at https://theconversation.com/passion-and-beauty-the-paintings-of-tony-tuckson-107591 The author suggests the exhibition 8 American Artists, organised by the Seattle Art Museum and shown in Sydney in 1958, had a profound effect on Tuckson, especially the work of Markey Tobey. 3. Mimmocchi, D., et al., Tony Tuckson, Art Gallery New South Wales, Sydney, 2018. DOUG HALL AM © Tony Tuckson/Copyright Agency 2023
Deutscher and Hackett
Apr. 10, 2023
Tony Tuckson
Est: $40 - $80
Collection Australian Art Books and Catalogues including 1) Tony Tuckson: 100 Small Drawings 1989: 2) Sydney Ball: The Colour Paintings 1963-2007, Penrith Regional Gallery 2008, hardcover in dust wrapper 2) Alison Rehfisch by Rachel Power, the Beagle Press, hardcover in dust wrapper 2002, hardcover in dust wrapper 3) 1940-1965 The Heroic Years of Australian Painting, The Herald Exhibition 1977, soft cover
Sydney Rare Book Auctions
Mar. 21, 2023
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973) Untitled, TD 1456 oil wash on paper
Est: $6,000 - $9,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973) Untitled, TD 1456 oil wash on paper 76.5 x 50.5cm PROVENANCE: The Estate of the Artist Watters Gallery, Sydney 2003 (label verso) Private collection, New South Wales
Leonard Joel
Feb. 23, 2023
TONY TUCKSON, UNTITLED CAT, TD 8850, PEN ON PAPER, 10 X 15CM, FRAME: 32 X 35CM PROVENANCE: WATTERS GALLERY, SYDNEY (LABEL VERSO)
Est: $700 - $1,000
TONY TUCKSON, UNTITLED CAT, TD 8850, PEN ON PAPER, 10 X 15CM, FRAME: 32 X 35CM PROVENANCE: WATTERS GALLERY, SYDNEY (LABEL VERSO)
Leonard Joel
Feb. 16, 2023
TONY TUCKSON, UNTITLED CAT, TD 8850, PEN ON PAPER, 10 X 15CM, FRAME: 32 X 35CM PROVENANCE: WATTERS GALLERY, SYDNEY (LABEL VERSO)
Est: $800 - $1,200
TONY TUCKSON, UNTITLED CAT, TD 8850, PEN ON PAPER, 10 X 15CM, FRAME: 32 X 35CM PROVENANCE: WATTERS GALLERY, SYDNEY (LABEL VERSO)
Leonard Joel
Dec. 04, 2022
TUCKSON Tony (1921-1973), Seated Woman (Green Dress), Gouache, 76x51cm
Est: $4,000 - $7,000
TUCKSON, Tony (1921-1973) Seated Woman (Green Dress) Gouache 76x51cm PROVENANCE: Christie's Melbourne May 2nd 2002 (lot 257); Art Galleries Schubert; private collection, Queensland.
Davidson Auctions
Dec. 02, 2022
Tony Tuckson
Est: $100 - $150
Collection of Tony Tuckson Catalogues including Tony Tuckson: 100 Small Drawings 1989, 2 copies of Small Figurative Drawings 2013, 2 copies of Tony Tuckson 1921-1973 by Daniel Thomas AGNSW 1976, 2 copies of Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) 1982, Family at Table 1991, Trios 2007, Pairs 2009, Woman 2005, Cocktails for Two 1999, 2 copies of Important Paintings 2006, Paintings 1989, Twenty Paintings on Canvas 1986 and heads 1995
Sydney Rare Book Auctions
Aug. 21, 2022
TUCKSON Tony (1921-1973), Christmas Card, c.1960., Screenprint on Newspaper, 13x15cm
Est: $200 - $4,000
TUCKSON, Tony (1921-1973) Christmas Card, c.1960. 'Happy Christmas from the Tucksons.' Screenprint on Newspaper 13x15cm PROVENANCE: Gift to the current owner from Margaret Tuckson, late 1980s.
Davidson Auctions
Aug. 21, 2022
TUCKSON Tony (1921-1973), Christmas Card, c.1955., Pencil & Gouache, 10.5x15cm
Est: $300 - $500
TUCKSON, Tony (1921-1973) Christmas Card, c.1955. Not signed or inscribed. Pencil & Gouache 10.5x15cm PROVENANCE: Gift to the current owner from Margaret Tuckson, late 1980s.
Davidson Auctions
Jul. 27, 2022
TONY TUCKSON, UNTITLED DRAWING #3 (TD 388), C.1953 – 56
Est: $5,000 - $8,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921 - 1973) UNTITLED DRAWING #3 (TD 388), c.1953 – 56 gouache on paper 76.5 x 101.5 cm (sheet) bears inscription verso: No 30 PROVENANCE Estate of the artist, Sydney Watters Gallery, Sydney Museum of Contemporary Art, Brisbane 100 Works from the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sotheby’s, Melbourne, 16 June 1991, lot 40 The Cbus Collection of Australian Art, Melbourne, acquired from the above EXHIBITED Tony Tuckson – Themes and Variations, Heide Park and Art Gallery, Melbourne, 2 May – 18 June 1989; Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 28 June – 27 August 1989, cat. 12 (label attached verso) IMPACT, Latrobe Regional Gallery, Victoria, 1 December 2012 – 21 April 2013 on long term loan to the Latrobe Regional Gallery, Victoria LITERATURE Maloon, T., Tony Tuckson – Themes and Variations, Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne, 1989, p. 24 Nainby, B., Stanhope, Z., and Furlonger, K., The Cbus Collection of Australian Art, in association with Latrobe Regional Gallery, Melbourne, 2009, pp. 15, 85 (illus.), 236 © Tony Tuckson/Copyright Agency 2022
Deutscher and Hackett
May. 04, 2022
TONY TUCKSON, FAMILY GROUP, 1952 - 54
Est: $35,000 - $45,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921 - 1973) FAMILY GROUP, 1952 - 54 oil on canvas 85.0 x 101.0 cm PROVENANCE Margaret Tuckson, Sydney Watters Gallery, Sydney (label attached verso) Private collection, Sydney, acquired from the above on 11 November 1986 EXHIBITED Tony Tuckson: Twenty Paintings on Canvas 1947 – 1957, Watters Gallery, Sydney, 1 – 18 October 1986, cat. 17 (as ‘(Family Group, 1952 – 54?)’) LITERATURE McGrath, S., ‘Tony Tuckson’, Art and Australia, Sydney, vol. 12, no. 2, October – December 1974, p. 159 (illus.) Thomas, D., Tony Tuckson 1921 – 1973, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 1976, cat. 12, pp. 26, 34 (illus., as (Family Group, 1954?)) [not exhibited] Thomas, D., Free, R. and Legge, G., Tony Tuckson, Craftsman House, Sydney, 1989, pl. 50, pp. 66 (illus.), 180 ESSAY While the story of Tony Tuckson’s ‘secret’ life as a painter while he worked at the Art Gallery of New South Wales as Assistant to the Director (1950 – 57) and then, Deputy Director (1957 – 1973) is now something of art world lore, the vitality of the works he produced over the course of his life continue to astound. Prior to his premature death at the age of 52, Tuckson had held only two exhibitions – in 1970 and 1973. As a result, it was not until the memorial exhibition of his work – curated by Daniel Thomas at the Art Gallery of NSW in 1976 – that both the art world and broader viewing public came to comprehend the scope and calibre of his life’s work. Since then, Tuckson has been rightly regarded as one of this country’s most significant artists and foremost abstractionists. Tuckson’s oeuvre charts a journey towards abstraction, and to a level of confidence and freedom that enabled him to produce his masterful abstract works of the early 1970s. At the time that Family Group, 1952 – 54 was created, Tuckson was absorbing a multitude of artistic influences, heightened in 1953 by first-hand experience of the touring exhibition French Painting Today, which included work by artists ranging from Léger and Picasso to Matisse, Mirò and Soulages. Works from the early to mid-1950s often feature figure groups and scenes from domestic life – subjects that were close to hand as Tuckson painted in the limited time available to him beyond the demands of his role at the Gallery. As Terence Maloon has noted (firmly tongue-in-cheek), the artist’s wife Margaret served as a model for many paintings and drawings: ‘…He half seriously assigned her the role of muse, of archetypal Woman, and she half-jokingly complied. There began a self-conscious and faintly comic series of travesties in which Margaret’s image was tossed between Tuckson’s various influences. For many years she was forced into cousinship with Picasso’s women – case as an angular Dora-Margaret or a curvaceous Margaret-Thérèse Walter. Intermittently she was incarnated as a Matisse odalisque, and during a few frustrated weeks in 1952 she almost became a Modigliani. By the time Tuckson fell under the sway of Dubuffet’s art brut in the mid 1950s, he no longer worked directly from the model – which, I suppose, was just as well for his wife’s morale.’1 The shadow of Picasso certainly looms large in the assured brushstrokes and blocky shapes of Family Group, with the work’s high-keyed palette of yellow, red, blue and black transforming a warm domestic scene into a study of pattern and colour that begins to dissolve the outline of the work’s three figures. 1. Maloon, T., Tony Tuckson: Themes and Variations, Heide Park and Art Gallery, Melbourne, 1989, p. 4 KELLY GELLATLY © Tony Tuckson/Copyright Agency 2021
Deutscher and Hackett
Dec. 01, 2021
Tony Tuckson, Australian 1921-1973- Untitled, abstract face; gouache and watercolour, signed, and i
Est: £1,800 - £2,200
Tony Tuckson, Australian 1921-1973- Untitled, abstract face; gouache and watercolour, signed, and inscribed present from Margaret on the reverse, 56x37cm(unframed) Provenance: Gifted to Klaus and Julie Friedeberger from the artist's wife Margaret Tuckson, thence by descent. Please refer to department for condition report
Roseberys
Dec. 01, 2021
Tony Tuckson, Australian 1921-1973- Untitled, abstract black; Chinese ink, signed and inscribed
Est: £1,200 - £1,800
Tony Tuckson, Australian 1921-1973- Untitled, abstract black; Chinese ink, signed and inscribed present from Margaret on the reverse, 37.5x56cm (unframed) Provenance: Gifted to Klaus and Julie Friedeberger from the artist's wife Margaret Tuckson, thence by descent. Please refer to department for condition report
Roseberys
Nov. 17, 2021
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) Untitled (TP531), 1957
Est: $10,000 - $15,000
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) Untitled (TP531), 1957 oil on pulpboard 52.0 x 33.0cm (20 1/2 x 13in). For further information on this lot please visit the Bonhams website
Bonhams
Nov. 17, 2021
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) Man with Straight Mouth (Tp 622), 1949
Est: $8,000 - $12,000
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) Man with Straight Mouth (Tp 622), 1949 oil on board 63.5 x 76.0cm (25 x 29 15/16in). For further information on this lot please visit the Bonhams website
Bonhams
Sep. 28, 2021
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973)
Est: $1,000 - $1,500
Male Drawing pencil on paper
Shapiro Auctioneers
Sep. 28, 2021
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973)
Est: $40,000 - $50,000
Black and White Abstract, TP218, c. 1959 oil on masonite
Shapiro Auctioneers
Jul. 30, 2021
TONY TUCKSON
Est: $50 - $80
Tony Tuckson by Free, Legge and Thomas. Craftsman House, 1989. Quarto size. Hardcover in dustwrapper. Remnants of stick tape and slight foxing to endpapers else a very good copy.
Sydney Rare Book Auctions
Jun. 30, 2021
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973), TD906 c1965
Est: $3,000 - $5,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973) TD906 c1965 synthetic polymer paint on newspaper 30.0 x 39.0 cm
Menzies
Jun. 08, 2021
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973) Untitled synthetic polymer paint on paper, on canvas
Est: $7,000 - $10,000
TONY TUCKSON (1921-1973) Untitled synthetic polymer paint on paper, on canvas 76 x 101.5cm (sheet); 83.5 x 109cm (canvas) PROVENANCE: Hugh Jamieson Collection, Sydney Corporate collection, Melbourne Private collection, Melbourne
Leonard Joel
Apr. 22, 2021
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) Untitled (Red and Black), c.1965
Est: $2,000 - $4,000
Tony Tuckson (1921-1973) Untitled (Red and Black), c.1965 synthetic polymer paint on newspaper 31.0 x 19.0cm (12 3/16 x 7 1/2in). For further information on this lot please visit the Bonhams website
Bonhams
Apr. 22, 2021
TONY TUCKSON, UNTITLED FIGURE, PENCIL ON PAPER, 20 X 8.5CM, CONDITION: SOME DISCOLOURATION PRESENT, MOST PROMINENTLY IN UPPER SECTIO...
Est: $300 - $500
TONY TUCKSON, UNTITLED FIGURE, PENCIL ON PAPER, 20 X 8.5CM, CONDITION: SOME DISCOLOURATION PRESENT, MOST PROMINENTLY IN UPPER SECTION. SIGNS OF BLOOMING ACROSS THE WORK, WITH MINOR COCKLING TO EDGES IF PAPER, SUGGESTING THE WORK IS NOT GLUED DOWN, HOWEVER IT HAS NOT BEEN INSPECTED OUTSIDE OF FRAME. LEONARD JOEL DELIVERY SIZE: SMALL
Leonard Joel
Apr. 22, 2021
TONY TUCKSON, UNTITLED TD97, PENCIL ON PAPER, 10.5 X 16.5CM, LEONARD JOEL DELIVERY SIZE: SMALL
Est: $250 - $350
TONY TUCKSON, UNTITLED TD97, PENCIL ON PAPER, 10.5 X 16.5CM, LEONARD JOEL DELIVERY SIZE: SMALL
Leonard Joel
Apr. 16, 2021
TONY TUCKSON
Est: $100 - $150
Tony Tuckson by Free, Legge and Thomas. Craftsman House, 1989. Quarto size. Hardcover in dustwrapper. Remnants of stick tape and slight foxing to endpapers else a very good copy.
Sydney Rare Book Auctions