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Lot 264
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Catherine Lee, American (b.1950), untitled, 1986, oil / oil stick on paper, 21 1/2"H x 29"W (sight), 31 1/2"H x 39"W (frame)
Catherine Lee, American (b.1950), untitled, 1986, oil / oil stick on paper, 21 1/2"H x 29"W (sight), 31 1/2"H x 39"W (frame)
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Description:

Catherine Lee
American, (b.1950)
untitled, 1986
oil / oil stick on paper
Signed and dated lower left.

Provenance: Midwest Museum of American Art.

Biography from Butler Institute of American Art: American sculptor. Lee came to prominence as a Minimalist in the 1970s. An interest in Modernism and the monochrome, as well as a hostility to narrative, made the grid her starting point, following which she began to paint predominantly in black.

In the mid-1980s she began to divide up her surfaces with dynamic diagonals and introduced more colour. "Nututun" is typical of this stage, when her work developed into wall reliefs: an irregular polygon in shape, it is divided into two fragments of amber-coloured, patinated bronze that partially enclose two smaller fragments of green-coloured bronze.

By the end of the decade she was making wall reliefs comprised of a number of small, shaped and differently coloured panels constructed from various metals, often arranged in large grid compositions. "40 Faults" consists of 40 large green-black patinated metal reliefs, similar to apostrophes in shape.

In the late 1990s she began to produce free-standing sculpture, though the forms of the pieces were still predominantly flat and frontal. "Sibyl" a large green patinated bronze, resembles an elongated rock. She also began to use ceramic as a material in her reliefs, and, by firing the pieces to produce prominent craquelure lines, she introduced a much greater emphasis on surface texture. While Lee's work has continued to situate itself in relation to Minimalism, she has developed an increasing interest in evoking landscape and natural materials.

Lee graduated with a BA in studio arts from San Jose State University in 1974. She was married to Irish
artist Sean Scully from 1978 until their divorce in 2003. They lived and worked in New York. Each year
during their marriage, he selected one of his paintings that he felt was especially important or typical
of his work for the year and reserved it for his collection, which he called the Catherine paintings. They
were exhibited at the Fort Worth Modern Art Museum in 1993. After spending more than thirty years
in New York City and exhibiting throughout the United States and the world, Lee left New York to
return to Texas and now lives and works outside of Wimberley.

  • Dimensions: 21 1/2"H x 29"W (sight), 31 1/2"H x 39"W (frame)
  • Medium: oil / oil stick on paper

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September 24, 2022 11:00 AM EDT
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