Lot 40: Herr Schoendorff, 1999

Herr Schoendorff, 1999
Oil, acrylic and graphite on panel in three parts. 182.9 x 213.4 x 8.9 cm. (72 x 84 x 3 1/2 in).   Signed, titled and dated 'Bickerton "Herr Schoendorff" 1999' on the reverse.

 New York, Sonnabend Gallery, Ashley Bickerton, May 15 - June 26, 1999

 J. Saltz, "The Art of Darkness: Ashley Bickerton's geek show", The Village Voice, New York, June 2 - 8, 1999

 Sonnabend Gallery, New York; The Marino and Paola Golinelli Collection, Bologna

Marvel at Bickerton's meticulous, mind-bending technique. You can almost hear the hiss of the airbrush. He's Norman Rockwell without a cause, Vargas with a demonic streak. The title of his show is Going Dutch: One Man's Odyssey Into the Depths of Anal Rentention.Taken literally, it suggests Bickerton is in pursuit of his verisimilitude and indulges a rage for detail often found in Dutch painting.... Here his darkness is gaining a fuller dimension. It is repellent, disturbing, but ultimately thrilling.
Possesed of enviable talent and unquestionable technique with an airbrush, Bickerton has continued to produce, and over the past decade has experienced a critical resurgence thanks to paintings that channel his simmering anger and resentment, the inevitable result of his fast rise and precipitious decline, into caustic and colorful shots across the bow of new-money elitism and indulgence, his razor-sharp wit intact despite his travails: look at Herr Schoendorff (1999), a man of a certain age, luxury, wealth, and leisure time. We see him about to die; suddenly ripped away from his martinis, boating, and golf, his leg has been torn off, vultures circle, and two headlights approach. But he sits up: he's still got some fight left in him. It's like a modern-day version of a Goya Disaster, and Bickerton knows something about disaster. (J. Saltz, Art of Darkness, The Village Voice, New York, June 2nd 1999).