Lot 59 D

From 1958 to 1961, Richard Hamilton worked on the iconic painting ‘$he’, which blends oil painting, airbrush and collage (it was initially a gift to his painting colleague William N. Copley, and since 1970 in the holdings of the Tate Gallery, London). In ‘$he’, the artist explores the favoured theme of the connection between modern consumerist-oriented domesticity and female identity. The fragmented silhouette of a woman – half pin-up with voluptuous curves and exposed shoulders, half housewife with apron – is staged with set pieces of household appliances from contemporaneous advertisements.
The ‘Study for $he’ offered here is one of four preliminary studies in which Hamilton prepares the pictorial elements. The model for the female figure was a photo of the actress Vikki Dougan who caused a stir in 1950s Hollywood with her extremely provocatively fashioned clothing. The development of a central pictorial idea, the skilful reinterpretation of the extremely low-cut back of Dougan’s dress into the form of a small apron, becomes clear – a motivic coup that is given particular emphasis in the executed painting.
“In spite of their contrived sophistication, my paintings are, for me, curiously ingenuous (like Marilyn Monroe). At first sight it is easy to mistake their intention as satirical. It looks as though […] the painting is a sardonic comment on our society. But I would like to think of my purpose as a search for what is epic in everyday objects and everyday attitudes. Irony has no place in it except in so far as irony is part of the ad man's repertoire”, Hamilton describes his artistic intention (quoted from: exhib.cat. Richard Hamilton, Tate Gallery, London 1970, p.38).
‘Study for $he’ has a significant provenance. The work was a gift from the artist to Joseph Beuys and has since been in the collection of the Beuys family; it has been prominently exhibited several times.