Collecting 101

1.

What is a Work on Paper?

Collectors of this category will tell you that one of its most exciting aspects is the diversity of its media, materials, techniques, and processes. There are even huge variances in the paper itself, which can be plant-based such as papyrus, animal-based such as parchment or synthetic.

It is, of course, up to the artist to decide which medium to apply to the paper support. Wet media includes acrylic, oil, and watercolour. Dry media includes charcoal, pencil, chalk, crayons, and pastel. In the case of collage, the medium is the paper. The artist composes the piece using torn or cut paper sourced from newspaper, textiles, coloured papers, photographs, magazines, and other ephemera.

A work on paper isn’t limited to any one process or material. Take, for instance, Maternité by Léonard Tsuguharu Foujita, encompassing gouache, watercolour, brush, pen, India ink, and gold leaf. Foujita’s references to the Madonnas of the Italian late Gothic can be seen in the use of gold leaf, which helps imbue the subjects — a mother and child — with a sense of radiance.

2.

Works on Paper in Modern Art

Connoisseurs often point to the end of the 19th century and early 20th century as the golden age of works on paper. Modernism celebrated experimentation and improvisation — two characteristics aided by the immediacy that working on paper offers — so it’s only natural that many modern artists experimented with paper-supported techniques.

It goes without saying, however, that works on paper were made long before the modernists of the west. Japanese and Chinese artists greatly influenced European art in the late 19th century. For instance, Pablo Picasso looked at the great Chinese master Qi Baishi and his spirited, energetic painting. In response, Picasso used brush and India ink to create numerous sketches in a calligraphic style.

Unlike large-scale oil painting or sculpture, which require a significant investment of time, material, and labour, works on paper allow an artist to work quickly and economically. This low-stakes framework fosters experimentation and innovation, and the resulting work on paper may exhibit bolder choices and riskier moves than the artist might typically make using a more conventional format.

On the other hand, when an artist uses restraint in terms of colour and medium, they’re forced to distil the substance of their oeuvre in the most essential of ways. Perhaps this is why Picasso’s work on paper Femme nue à sa toilette, which was sold by Bonhams in 2017 for £100,000 inc. premium, looks so quintessentially of the artist — so pure in intention and style. Using the sparsest of detail and deliberate, confident lines, Picasso amalgamates a number of viewpoints to allow the viewer to behold the subject at her most voluptuous.

3.

Why Collect Works on Paper?

While artists typically make paintings on canvas with the intention of exhibition and collection, works on paper are often created simply for the artist’s own pleasure or practice. Frequently found in sketchbooks, they offer intimate glimpses into an artist’s life and process, making works on paper ideal collectables for those wanting an insight into the artist’s working method.

We can see the mind of a genius rendered on the page in pieces like Alberto Giacometti's Diego assis and Kopf - und Handstudien by Gustav Klimt, which Bonhams sold for £35,062 inc. premium. The latter is a study for three key figures from Klimt’s now-famous Beethoven Frieze. Looking at it, one can understand what the journalist Franz Servaes meant when, in 1908, he noted how ‘mysteriously naked females stood silently at his easel [as] they wandered to and from… obediently halting in their tracks as soon as the artist espied a pose of a movement that his sense of beauty impelled him to capture in a swiftly executed sketch.’

Collecting works on paper also allows one to behold aspects of an artist’s everyday life. In Paul Gaugin’s watercolour monotype Paysage de Bretagne, the artist uses the back of a poster by Camille Marten as his support. Not only does this fact illustrate the immediacy of Gaugin’s working method, it also ties the piece to other works similarly rendered on repurposed posters. In this case, and many others, the everyday life of the artist is literally embedded into the work itself.

These quotidian artworks may be informal, but informality does not mean insignificance. Take the drawings made by Henri Matisse while bed-bound, for instance. Matisse created a series of 158 drawings while convalescing in his hotel room by resting a drawing board against a rolling table attached to his bed. (Suffering from a painful recovery, he was unable to sit for long periods or paint in front of an easel.)

4.

Modern Works on Paper at Auction

Works on paper have consistently performed well at Bonhams’ auctions. Price points can vary significantly among works on paper. Signed pieces tend to sell for more than unsigned works by the same artist. As mentioned previously, many works on paper weren’t specifically intended for circulation, and thus not all works are signed.

Some of the most notable highlights from previous Bonhams auctions include: Foujita’s Nu allongé, depicting a reclining nude in mineral paint and ink on silk laid on paper, sold for £982,750 inc. premium in 2021. Alberto Giacometti’s coloured pencil drawing Tête, which sold for £87,750 inc. premium in 2021, is rendered with frenetic coloured lines that emphasize an important technique of the artist’s late period. Matisse’s cutouts are now among his most recognizable works, and Arbre de neige, which sold for £1,190,403 inc. premium in 2017, is no exception. And last but not least, Joan Miró’s Les Essències de la Terra, a series of seven unique works in watercolours, India ink, and charcoal on lithographic base, sold for £143,812 inc. premium in 2019.

Later this year, we will be holding our first dedicated modern works on paper auction. To find out more about this sale or to receive a complimentary and confidential valuation of works in your collection, please contact impressionists@bonhams.com.