~LARGE RICHARD HAMBLETON . . SOLD FOR $150,000 !!
THE SHADOWMAN . . RISES.
oh, yes.
CONTRA GALLERY . . just sold their large RICHARD HAMBLETON for $150,000 . . !!!
LONG LIVE THE LOWER EAST SIDE of the 80s & 90s !!!
LONG LIVE THE TRUE / REAL GRITTY !!!
RICHARD HAMBLETON was mean, but so were the streets / he was the real deal.
a unique voice (scream ?!!) that captured his time / let’s raise a glass to the hard-working people / the scramblers, the hustlers.
the true underground heroes of the Lower East Side, when it was raw and . . happening.
I mean, inadvertently . . he did provide us with shelter, and that (illegal) storefront kept us warm and, up & running, rent-free / for for almost 10 years – right in the heart of the action.
those were . . walk on the dark side days, and damn it he caught it / and that’s why his work is reverberating with a wider audience, today. he was a real ‘one-off’. he threw that rebel street art / right smack up against the law-of-the-jungle inner city, just before the endless waves of fine-tuned grad students descended. he made a case for the disenfranchised, and neglected.
think on it: in just a decade it would be Shepard Fairey’s ‘Obey’ giant . . . looking down from the street lamps, with their reference to nascent social media, and template expression.
RICHARD HAMBLETON, ‘Walking Woman (Beautiful)’, 1992.
acrylic paint, industrial paint on stretched canvas, 76 x 24 in.
signed & titled . . on the back / it is dated on the front.
image courtesy CONTRA GALLERY
signed & titled / on the back.
image courtesy CONTRA GALLERY
PHOTO: NANCY SMITH
a wall of . . . history in the making !!
archival black & white 35mm photographs by BEN BUCHANAN, incl a young & unknown Basquiat / & 2 RICHARD HAMBLETON paintings
the large one in the center . . .
just sold for – for $150,000.
at CONTRA GALLERY – CHELSEA.
brought to you by curator, artist, & soon-to-be filmmaker . . ALFREDO MARTINEZ.
in other words:
the so-called . . ‘REAL FAKE’ / MARTINEZ brings you . . the ‘REAL DEAL’ / SHADOWMAN / aka LITTLE RICHARD HAMBLETON
bring it on – ALFREDO !! / LONG LIVE THE ‘REAL GRIT’ . . & HARD-CORE !!!
long live – the ‘TRUE’ UNDERGROUND.
‘THE SHADOWMAN MEETS THE FEMININE’ . . . is up for 2 more weeks.
CONTRA GALLERY – 122 W 26th ST, 5th FLOOR / CHELSEA / CHECK WITH GALLERY FOR VIEWING HRS