Lot 7: § IAN STEPHENSON, BRITISH (1934-2000). 'Retrospect 6 spray study', 1963. Oil and paper on paper collage.

§ IAN STEPHENSON, BRITISH (1934-2000). 'Retrospect 6 spray study', 1963. Oil and paper on paper collage.
Typed label verso '31 Retrospect 6 Spray Study 1963. Lent By Michael Compton'. Also with British Council Fine Arts Department label verso.

PROVENANCE: Gifted to Michael Compton by the artist. This work was exhibited at 11 Englische Zeichner in Baden-Baden May-June 1973, an exhibition of 100 works on paper in various media by 11 artists. The exhibition was also shown in Antwerp as part of the Europalia 73 Festival. Prior to the exhibition in Europe the work was first shown at an informal British Arts Council preview at the Hayward Gallery, London in March 1973.

This lot is part of a single owner collection of 28 lots to include Roy Lichtenstein, Marcel Broodthaers, Terry Frost, Henry Moore, Richard Long, Victor Newsome, Keith Milow, Billy Al Bengston, Ian Stephenson, Sol LeWitt and Joe Tilson.

IAN STEPHENSON (1934-2000): Ian Stephenson was an English abstract artist trained at King's College, Durham along with Noel Forster and had his first solo show in London at the New Vision Centre in 1958. An exhibition of his work was shown at the Hayward Gallery, London in 1977 and his work can be found in the collections of the Tate, the British Council and Whitworth Art Gallery. His work was also featured in the 1966 film, Blow-Up by Michelangelo Antonioni.

Compton was closely involved with the artist in the seventies and wrote the following statement which was displayed as the wall text accompanying a selection of Stephenson studies shown at the Arts Council Exhibition 'Art as Thought Process'', Hayward Gallery, London c.1975.
"Stephenson's paintings are characteristically made by spattering droplets of paint on to the surface of canvas or paper. A layer of one colour succeeds another until the painting is complete. Because the droplets are distinct and quite widely spaced they obliterate some but not all of the previous layers so that the final effect is determined not only by the colour and quantity of the spots of paint but by the order in which they were applied. Generally in the paintings (but not in the drawings) there are no sharply defined changes across the surface. The composition is therefore as much a matter of depth and sequence as of extension and separation, a characteristic which is mirrored in the fact that its effect changes greatly as you approach it or draw back. A painting, however, may be made up of several joined canvases of varying or alternating composition". - Quoted in The Tate Gallery 1974-6:Illustrated Catalogue of Acquisitions, London, 1976.

h:25.20 w:22 in.