Distinguished Patrons of Contemporary Art

Fatima and Eskandar Maleki met as childhood friends in Tehran. Both came from prominent Persian families. Fatima’s family stem from a long line of diplomats and politicians. In January 1979, the family were in France at the time of the Iranian Revolution and it became apparent that they could not return to their homeland. With few material possessions, the family had to start again and build a new life in Europe and America. As their fortunes began to improve, they began to take an interest in purchasing arts and objects to decorate their home. Their collecting journey started by trying to emulate the sort of interior that Fatima’s parents had decorated their home with in Iran. For the young couple, they started off with a very ‘classical’ eye. However, it was a conversation with Eskandar’s cousin, the architect Kamran Diba, that changed their approach to “buy from your time.” And so began an enriching journey into the world of Contemporary Art.

When the family moved to London, Fatima studied at the Royal Academy and at Christie’s. She also earned a Masters degree in Contemporary and Modern Art from Sotheby’s. During this time, Fatima started to visit different Contemporary Art galleries. She involved her husband in this process, and gradually the two of them started to share the same taste, and became immersed in this field through meeting so many different artists. In the words of Fatima: “It was a living art, because you could see the artist, you could talk to the artist.”

It was then that Fatima and Eskandar opened up their house within the London art scene, with a desire to connect artists with collectors, and simply bring so many different people together. This sort of thing, very common in Iran, was rarely done in London and thus 28 South Street became a place which embodied the warmth of Persian hospitality. As Fatima explained: “Eventually, collectors met their artists here, artists met their patrons here. To date, we have been invited to 11 or 12 weddings of people who met in this house. It was a very happy house.”

Fatima Maleki has been both patron, supporter, panel judge or committee member of no less than 39 global art institutions and art fairs. The Malekis have also supported as sponsors many exhibitions at renowned institutions. They have always been staunch supporters of emerging young artists. In their stunning Beaulieu home in the South of France, they have an artist in residence scheme which continues to support young artists who are starting their journey into the field of Contemporary Art.

Jacob Kassay (American B. 1984)

Born in New York and based in New York City, artist-critic Jacob Kassay takes a cerebral, minimalist approach to creation. He is represented by 303 Gallery and has exhibited at ICA London, MCA Chicago, and the MFA Boston. Known for his innovative treatment of flat surfaces, Kassay has turned to mirror-like acrylic and canvas scraps in the service of his post-conceptual practice.

We are pleased to be offering this work, Untitled, by Kassay (Lot 95). In its total abstraction, the work calls attention to the blurred lines between art and the everyday. Were it not for the frame, what would separate the canvas from the wall behind? Yet, Untitled is not so much the ‘zero point’ of painting in the mould of Kazimir Malevich’s Black Square as a restrained example of decorative art. In constant dialogue with its environment, Untitled catches the light of a room and alters it, adding new dimensions to an interior space.

Julian Schnabel (American B. 1951)

Painter-director Julian Schnabel has enjoyed international renown for his powerful aesthetic vision. Among the first artists represented by Mary Boone, Schnabel has since exhibited at Pace Gallery, the Art Gallery of Ontario, and Museo Correr. His large-scale works tend to incorporate an element of collage, as the traditional marriage of oil and canvas is adulterated with an admixture of resin, textiles, and even ceramic shards. The present picture (Lot 107), which reads ‘Monjas de calle con buen ojo’, or ‘Street nuns with a keen eye’, belongs to a series by the same title. A typically obscure juxtaposition of concepts, this imposing canvas reflects Schnabel’s preoccupation with religion and literature. His decisive mark-making allows for striking visual effects: the calligraphy of ‘ojo’ for example, resembles a face, while the sinuous dividing line suggests the form of an amphora. Schnabel never stoops to sacrilege, nor does he endorse uncritically; the artist’s early exposure to Meso-American Catholicism invests his Neo-Expressionist works with a personal resonance. Schnabel treats his thematic concerns with parity: the holy and the profane, tradition and modernity, abstraction and figuration.

Friedrich Kunath (German B. 1974)

German-born Friedrich Kunath has equal recourse to popular and high culture in his tragicomic works. Kunath has exhibited at Art Basel, Modern Art Oxford, and White Cube, London. Often surreal, Kunath’s works construct and inhabit universes of bright colour and forbidding black, inspiring hope as much as they threaten the viewer with loneliness. Characteristically, Lot 117, The sleeves are brown and the tie is grey features a solitary figure lost at sea, a scene infused with Romantic sensibilities. The picture draws its title from the celebrated refrain of California Dreamin’ – ‘All the leaves are brown / And the sky is grey’ – with slight modifications, reproduced in cursive text on the work itself. Kunath has updated the song’s autumnal vocabulary as if to evoke notions of oppressive corporate uniformity. The artist’s relocation to Los Angeles from East Germany may have informed this yearning for a better, brighter life, though the insistent pathos of his work suggests this dream was never fully realised – perhaps the grass is, after all, always greener on the other side.

Olafur Eliasson (Icelandic-Danish B. 1967)

An Icelandic-Danish artist of international renown, Olafur Eliasson is celebrated for his installations, from small sculptures to immersive public experiences such as The weather project, 2003 at the Tate Modern. He has won the Eugene McDermott Award in the Arts and the Praemium Imperiale; MoMA, ZKM, MCA, and MAM Paris have all exhibited his work. The Studio Olafur Eliasson has expanded over time and become a hub for conducting experiments, testing designs, and realising architectural projects. The artist’s highly ambitious and influential practice has resulted in many prominent commissions, including the Mies van der Rohe award-winning Harpa concert hall and The New York City Waterfalls, 2008. What unites Eliasson’s diverse oeuvre is his focus on spatiality and atmospheric effects. In part, Square sphere (Lot 162) is a cerebral, paradoxical investigation into the geometric forms that so fascinated the Renaissance masters. It is also a rare and attractive centrepiece from an edition of ten with two artist’s proofs, one that fragments and recomposes its environment, in line with Eliasson’s investigations into the nature of perception.

Talking about the work, Fatima said "The first time I went to the Tate and saw the exceptional hall that he had done… it just took my breath away… in the afternoon we went to Germany and I saw this Olafur Eliasson hanging in the gallery… remembering the Tate we just had to purchase it… it’s all about light and it’s just beautiful.”

Keith Coventry (British B. 1958)

The restrained and often abstract works of Keith Coventry engage meaningfully with sociohistorical concerns. Coventry won the John Moores Painting Prize in 2010; his works can be found in the collections of Tate Modern, MoMA, and the Walker Art Center. The artist’s practice is diverse, ranging from monochromatic impasto to Walter Sickert references and interpretations of Han van Meegeren’s forgeries. Coventry has classified the present diptych (Lot 175) – a typically unusual and tongue-in-cheek juxtaposition – as ‘abstract history paintings’ (Keith Coventry, Hirst, Fairhurst, Hume, Coventry, Quinn, p. 14). Reminiscent of Kazimir Malevich’s suprematist canvases, these works support the Derridean understanding of title as parergon, without which the image itself remains indeterminate. The Millwall picture alludes to the 1985 Luton riot, which saw the notoriously unruly visitors clash with home supporters. This instance of hooliganism is associated with Alexander the Great’s triumphant Siege of Aornos in a somewhat misleading David-and-Goliath arrangement, as in both cases the warring parties were evenly matched. The similarity and visual impact of this pair alludes to their overarching significance as a monument to narrative: moments across millennia, from the theatre of war to the sporting arena, are linked by their readiness to be chronicled and, more often than not, mythologised.

Matthew Day Jackson (American B. 1974)

A versatile and prolific artist, Matthew Day Jackson is represented by Pace Gallery; he has exhibited at MFA Boston, Portland Museum of Fine Art, and the Whitney Museum. What unites many of his varied works is a focus on landscape and nationhood, particularly as regards American cultural identity. We are pleased to be offering this work, titled Dresden by Jackson (Lot 183). The panel, whose material vocabulary speaks to Jackson’s interest in mortality and destruction, is not alone in the artist’s oeuvre. Jackson’s 2012 sculpture in the same media, August 6, 1945, presents an aerial view of San Franciso, counterfactually devastated by the atomic bomb that struck Hiroshima. His 2017 rendering by the same title turns to New York, continuing this imagined history. Only that of Dresden need not be imagined: in 1945, the city was ravaged by an Allied attack, the disproportionate intensity of which compromised the morality of its perpetrators. Jackson thus calls attention to modern crises of international justice and the questionable righteousness of its loudest proponents.

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Auction Details

Auction:
Wednesday 25 September, 10.30am BST
Dreweatts, Donnington Priory, Newbury, Berkshire RG14 2JE

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On View:
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Tuesday 3 - Thursday 5 September 2024: 10am - 4pm

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Friday 20 - Wednesday 25 September 2024

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