Untitled (SF73-656), 1973

Name: Untitled (SF73-656), 1973
Brand: Sam Francis
Availability: InStock

Sam Francis

Medium: acrylic on paper

Signature: estate stamp signature on verso

Framed size: 23 x 20"

Price on Request

Size 14 x 11 14 x 11

15513581

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"Untitled (SF73-656)" is an acrylic on paper painting created by Sam Francis in 1973. The artwork is estate stamped and numbered verso. The artwork ships framed in a contemporary closed-corner gold leaf frame and has a framed size of 23 x 20".

“Untitled (SF73-656),” executed in 1973, is a jewel like example of Sam Francis’s mature works on paper. Intimate in scale yet expansive in feeling, the painting pulses with color, motion, and spatial depth. Estate stamped on the reverse, it belongs to a highly regarded period when Francis refined his visual language around gesture, light, and the expressive power of white space.

Vertically oriented, the composition centers on a loosely defined rectangular form rendered in vibrant indigo. The blue is modulated with washes of emerald green and punctuated by small flashes of yellow, creating a chromatic field that feels both luminous and atmospheric. The edges of this central structure are fluid rather than fixed. They subtly spill beyond implied boundaries, giving the shape an organic presence that suggests emergence rather than containment.

The surrounding white paper functions as an active field rather than empty ground. Across it runs a network of flicks, drips, and directional strokes that animate the surface. Some gestures feel spontaneous and impulsive, while others form delicate linear paths that introduce rhythm and structure. The interplay between defined form and improvisational mark making creates a dynamic tension that is central to Francis’s work.

By 1973, Francis had fully matured into a personal vocabulary rooted in chromatic intensity and spatial balance. Blue, a color he returned to repeatedly, evokes air, water, and inner light, while accents of green and yellow enliven the composition like notes in a musical score. His works on paper were essential to his process, offering immediacy and freedom that complemented his larger canvases.

“Untitled (SF73-656)” captures a moment of suspended energy where color and gesture achieve fleeting equilibrium. With its rhythmic linework and luminous palette, it stands as a refined meditation on movement and space, embodying the quiet authority of Francis’s mature practice.

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32325071896647::14 x 11::::,

Details

Medium: acrylic on paper
Year: 1973

Image size: 14 x 11"
Framed size: 23 x 20"

Signature: estate stamp signature on verso

Reference:

SF73-656

About the Work

About the Artist

Sam Francis (1923 – 1994), internationally celebrated for his radiant use of color and light, stands as one of the great figures of postwar abstraction. His bold canvases, rooted in Abstract Expressionism yet enriched by global influences from Paris to Tokyo, speak directly to today’s collectors seeking works that transcend boundaries of place and time. Francis’s paintings and works on paper are represented in the world’s leading museums, including MoMA (New York), Tate (London), Centre Pompidou (Paris), LACMA (Los Angeles), and SFMOMA. His market remains exceptionally strong, underscored by recent record-breaking sales and renewed curatorial attention, such as LACMA’s 2023 exhibition Sam Francis and Japan: Emptiness Overflowing. With their luminous expanses of white and bursts of vivid blues, reds, and golds, Francis’s works feel startlingly contemporary, anchoring him as a cornerstone of 20th-century art whose vision remains vital in the 21st-century market.

Untitled (SF73-656), 1973

$78,850.00

14 x 11

SELECTED WORK

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