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• Auction House:
  Mossgreen-Webb's
• Sale Name:
  Important Paintings & Contemporary Art
• Sale Date:
  11 Apr 2017 ~ 6.30pm (NZ time)
• Lot #:
  25
• Lot Description:
  Leo Bensemann
  Self Portrait - Grey Coat
  oil on canvasboard, c. 1936-1937
  340mm x 265mm
• Provenance:
  From the family of Leo Bensemann, passed by descent to the present owner.
• Exhibited:
  Possibly exhibited at Leo Bensemann's retrospective exhibition, Akaroa, 1972.
• References:
  ILLUSTRATED: Simpson, Peter, Fantastica: The World of Leo Bensemann, Auckland University Press 2011, p. 48; Otto, Caroline, Portraits, Masks and Fantasy Figures Nikau Press, 2005, p. 31 and front cover image.
• Notes:
  The first oil portrait Leo Bensemann ever exhibited - Smiling Man (CSA, 1936) - was a self-portrait and he continued making self-portraits all his life, his last in the genre being a couple of superb pencil portraits (one now in Alexander Turnbull Library, the other in Christchurch Art Gallery) from 1981. In total, he produced over a dozen self-portraits, more than half of them dating (like the present work) from the late 1930s. This number pales in comparison with his friend and contemporary Rita Angus's more than 50 self-portraits but is still a significant contribution to the genre. Some of Bensemann's self-portraits were pencil drawings and others were oil paintings. However, in one unique instance, including the present painting, he made three works - one drawing and two paintings - which are so similar, in terms of posture, cropping of the body and treatment of head and face, that, clearly, they are closely related to each other. The undated pencil drawing obviously came first while the two paintings - different in size, shape and colour, and in the clothing and background of the subject - were developed from the drawing as a preliminary study: a common but not invariable practice with Bensemann's portraiture. All three works are illustrated on pages 48-49 of Peter Simpson, Fantastica: The World of Leo Bensemann (AUP, 2011). The three works show the upper torso and head in left profile; in the present work, the smaller of the two paintings - which may have been exhibited at Bensemann's Retrospective Exhibition in Akaroa in 1972, for which it is dated 1936 - he is shown wearing a white jacket with upturned collar, posed against a solid blue background. The subject is a handsome, fine-featured, black-haired young man in his early 20s (aged about 23 to 25) with distinctive, dark, joined-up eyebrows. His expression is serious, even sombre. Perhaps intense self-examination in a mirror accounts for the earnest demeanour but a melancholy cast to the features suggests more than a momentary mood. His solemnity removes from the work any suggestion of narcissistic self-absorption. He is not striking a melancholic Hamlet-like pose but, rather, telling the truth of what he sees in the mirror. Though painted early in his career as a portraitist, this self-portrait with its clean lines, bold colour and psychological acuity already illustrates Bensemann's exceptional skills. PETER SIMPSON
• Estimate:
  NZ$18,000 - 25,000
• Realised Price:
  *****
  

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• Category:
  Art

This Sale has been held and this item is no longer available. Details are provided for information purposes only.