Terminus: Drawings and Recent Paintings, a solo exhibition by Raoul De Keyser at David Zwirner through October 14, featured some 50 small abstractions with a geometric bent. I was taken with the intimacy of the work and with the playful, almost naive, shapes and colors.
Raoul De Keyser, Crawly, 2009, oil on canvas, app. 13.5 x 17.5 inches
But that's only half of why I'm writing about the show. The other half is to talk about the prices. The small paintings--most not much larger than 12 inches in any one dimension--had enormous prices. How enormous? Like $55,000 to $75,000 enormous. And there were red dots next to most of them. Want to guess the price of Crawly, above? See for yourself:
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Did I step into an alternate universe? In this beautiful show, most of the paintings, in the high five figures, were red dotted
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. The three paintings on the wall, above, are shown in the price list below:
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Below: Also on the price list is Complex, 2009, oil on canvas, 12 x 10 7/8 inches. Price: $55,000
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