Erotic Dumas painting to go under hammer

Work titled ‘Oktober 1973’ could fetch up to R5 million

A SUPERB, early erotic painting by internationally acclaimed Marlene Dumas, never before seen on the market, adorns the catalogue cover of the first joint auction by the French and South African houses Piasa and Aspire later this month in Cape Town.

On February 14, her piece titled Oktober 1973, will only be the third Dumas painting ever offered at auction in South Africa.

Estimated at £160 000 to £260 000 (R3 million to R5 million), the work is set to attract significant interest.

In 1995 Dumas represented Holland in the Venice biennale, and in 1996 the Tate Gallery exhibited a selection of her works on paper.

In 2005, Dumas held the distinction of achieving the highest price ever at auction for a woman artist when her painting of 1987, titled The Teacher,

sold at Christie’s London in 2005 for £1.8 million (R34.6m). Her current auction high was set when The Visitor

(1995) sold in 2008 for £3 177 250 (R61m).

Dumas, widely regarded as one of the most influential painters working today, grew up on a wine farm in the Cape, enjoying local schooling and university education, before relocating to Amsterdam in 1976.

Oktober 1973 was painted in Dumas’ second year at Cape Town’s Michaelis School of Fine Art during a time of local and global student uprisings seeking political and sexual liberation.

This remarkable work, a refreshingly candid painting of a naked woman in the throes of erotic pleasure, fearlessly addresses many of the social issues of its time.

The large expanse of the pink torso with its green genitalia, pays homage to the powerful paintings of Pop artists like Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg.

However, it’s subject – erotic passion – was to become an abiding interest for the artist throughout her career.

In many ways, this early painting prefigures later works such as those in her 2018 exhibition Marlene Dumas: Myths and Mortals at David Zwirner in New York. Dumas has produced paintings, collages, drawings, prints and installations.

She now works mainly with oil on canvas and ink on paper.

The sources she uses for her imagery are diverse and include newspaper and magazine cuttings, personal memorabilia, Flemish paintings, and polaroid photographs.

Christophe Person, of French auction house Piasa, said: “The South African market is one of the most dynamic on the continent.

“But until now collectors have been mostly focused on local artists and less on art from other African countries.

“What is special about this new partnership between Aspire and Piasa is that it offers a pan-African vision of contemporary creation.”

The landmark auction: Modern and Contemporary African Art is at OroAfrica House in Cape Town at 3pm.

The curated collection comprises 198 lots, featuring 139 artists representing 27 countries from Africa and the diaspora.