Beschreibung:

DEBORAH BUTTERFIELD (B. 1949)Untitled (2470), 2001 cast bronze 38 x 43 x 10 in. 96.5 x 109.2 x 25.4 cm. FootnotesProvenance Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco Acquired directly from the above by the present owner in 2001 "For over 35 years, I have used the horse as a metaphor for the Mother Earth. They represent what is/was wonderful about our earth — what we haven't ruined yet. My animals keep me honest and keep me striving to be the best I can be. They are witnesses on the earth." -Deborah Butterfield While studying at UC Davis in 1973, Deborah Butterfield began sculpting horses; the form to which the artist has dedicated her career. Though Butterfield explored other less enduring mediums earlier in her career, such as organic material and paper mâché, she is most celebrated for her virtuosity in bronze. Constructing her equine subjects by casting driftwood out of bronze, Butterfield beguiles viewers with forms that are graceful yet resolute, seemingly fragile but forceful and strong. The present lot is an exemplary demonstration of Butterfield's seductive manipulation of material to create dynamic and intricate visual effects that solidify her work as instantly recognizable and iconic. The horse is a powerful and enduring symbol in the canon of Western Art History and in our daily lives. A creature of strength and elegance, horses have a complex symbolic presence. As Steph Rodney writes, "At its core, these sculptures are a visual metaphor for ineffable nature of a creature we consistently use and sometimes revere, but do not take into our homes. Horses have always been close to us, a crucial part of our development into modern people, our metonym for speed, yet alien, not truly domesticated because they live for themselves, not us." (The Deceptive Power of a Drove of Horse Sculptures, Hyperallergic, 22 May 2017) Earlier in her career, Butterfield sculpted mares, which she saw as self-portraits. In these works, the female horse counters the stereotypes of horses sculpted in bronze, specifically stallions, as symbols of domination and power, consequently relinquishing the creature back to nature, where the horse, according to Butterfield, has been "just as subjugated as women." (Colette Copeland, The Horse as Witness and Metaphor: A Chat with Deborah Butterfield Glasstire, 14 November 2020) Butterfield uses bronze to consider the creature in new ways which embrace speciesism and the vulnerability of the horse and ourselves. In 1979 Butterfield repurposed steel fences to create her horses, shaping the creatures in a more skeletal and exposed way which Butterfield found functioned as "as an expression of an emotional state. Rather than a solid structure, the horses became a three-dimensional drawing." (Colette Copeland, The Horse as Witness and Metaphor: A Chat with Deborah Butterfield Glasstire, 14 November 2020) The exposed corporeality of the horses eventually led the artist to explore casting driftwood, working closely with the Walla Walla Foundry. Cast from ōhiʻa wood found in Hawai'i, the present lot is particularly special to the artist. The site where Butterfield found the ōhiʻa wood has since been turned into a protected park, making this one of the only works of its kind. Native to Hawai'i, ōhiʻa wood is known for its rich and variable color, which is brought to life in bronze in the present lot. Striking in its realism this trompe l'oeil effect further reiterates the symbolic and actual power of the horse. An enormous production and true labor of love, Butterfield engages over twenty foundry specialists to cast her sculptures, each of which can take nine or more months to complete. Deborah Butterfield is one of the most celebrated and cherished sculptors of our time. Her work can be found in public collections including the Art Institute of Chicago; The Brooklyn Museum; Cincinnati Museum; Dallas Museum of Art; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; San Fra