Mark Tobey (1890-1976)

Previously in the collection of press photographer Eddy Novarro (c. 1925-2003), the present work speaks to the network of relationships woven between artists across geography and time. Having met René Magritte in the late 1950s, Novarro soon became a fixture within the remnant of the Paris surrealist circle, photographing Pablo Picasso, Marcel Duchamp, Salvador Dalí and others. A self-proclaimed cosmopolitan, Novarro traveled all over the world, ending up in New York City some two decades later, where he encountered the bastions of Pop, including Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein and Robert Rauschenberg. Such presence among the vanguards of the twentieth century not only rendered Novarro a touchpoint for culture, but also contributed to his eclectic collection of gifts from the "who's who" of the art world, Mark Tobey's Untitled (1960) being an intimate example of one of these special treasures.