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| Image | Sale date | Auction house | Location | Sale name | Lot No. | Estimate | Price Sold | Condition | Title |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Oct 9, 2014 | Swann Galleries | New York | African-American Fine Art | 140 | $****** - ****** | Singing Head |
sculpture
41.9 x 20.3 x 19 cm (16.5 x 7.99 x 7.48 in)
carved tropical wood, with painted details
Initialed "EC" at the lower edge
acquired directly from the artist
private California collection. The owner met Elizabeth Catlett in Mexico City in 1975 and commissioned this work from the artist shortly thereafter. The next year the artist moved to Cuernavaca. This large modern head is an exquisite example of Elizabeth Catlett's mid-career sculpture in carved wood. The singing head or cabeza cantando is an important theme to Catlett and indicates the influence of both Mexican and African-American traditons in her work. Singing Head is an emodiment of self-expression and identity - it represents the many cultures and influences found in the artist's work. Several of Catlett's sculptures have an open expressive or singing mouth. There are also earlier wood versions with painted details The Black Woman Speaks 1970 in the collection of David C. Drisklell and her "more abstract Africanized Singing Head in mahogany in 1975" as described by Melanie Herzog. Catlett made other smaller versions of this type of head in both orange onyx 1979 in the collection of the James E. Lewis Museum of Art Morgan State University and black marble 1980 in the collection of the National Museum of American Art Washington DC. In addition Catlett made a much smaller version in cast bronze (see lot 139). Herzog p. 154
