Lot  245 Ravenel Autumn Auction 2021 Taipei

Ravenel Autumn Auction 2021 Taipei

Fire

Mr Doodle (British, 1994)

2019

Acrylic on canvas

200 x 200 cm

Estimate

TWD 5,500,000-8,000,000

HKD 1,536,000-2,235,000

USD 197,500-287,300

CNY 1,282,000-1,865,000

Sold Price

TWD 9,600,000

HKD 2,696,629

USD 346,320

CNY 2,206,897


Signature

Sign lower right MR DOODLE!


PROVENANCE
Anzai Gallery, Tokyo Private collection, Asia

EXHIBITED Art Fair Tokyo, Anzai Gallery, Tokyo, Martch 7-10 Martch 2019

+ OVERVIEW

British talented artist Mr Doodle wins enormous popularity across the world by creating with his marker densely laying out simple graffiti lines. He started his artistic career at the age of nine and has such an extraordinary personal style. His English hippie and humor enabled him to attract countless fans. If one ever watches his live improvisation, the viewers must be amazed at his never repeated one-stroke painting. Mr Doodle is inspired by either contemporary pop elements or daily life experience, in his graffiti world, his weird characters and symbols are distinctively unique and fully satisfy the whimsical viewers, the vivid fantasy weaved in his graffiti brings the joy with imagination.

He described his work as "compulsive graffiti" and the only antidote is to create as much as he can, relying on his love of graffiti as obsessive-compulsive disorder, he painted any objects that he could get and filled his bedroom with graffiti. He quickly created a brand-new visual phenomenon: the iconic "Doodle Land", with his dense symbols, objects and patterns keep reproducing and multiplying, demonstrating his view of the universe. His style is often described as "Graffiti Spaghetti", his creation is not only applied on canvas, but also furniture, books, subway stations and clothing etc., he created an ever-expanding world full of novelty and fun. In 2018, he held a large-scale solo exhibition "Doodle World" at the Ara Art Center in Seoul, and later collaborated with brands such as Samsung, PUMA, Fendi etc., he became a new generation artist who have gained popularity all over the world and numerous fans in recent years.

"The process of creating this series of works is full of fun. I hope that the audience can look at art through my perspective in a relaxed and humorous way, and make fun of it." — Mr Doodle

This autumn presents a series of Mr Doodle works. In addition to a series of iconic one-stroke works, there are also works from the early Mr Doodle period created in the name of Dr Scribble. Dr Scribble first appeared in the solo exhibition "Attention Seeker" held in London in 2016. He even created an IG account under the name of Dr Scribble in 2017 and published works independent from Mr Doodle, positioning as his evil twin brother. Based on the black background and lines in white, the cute and somewhat evil graffiti style shows another facet of his graffiti art. Through the shaping of Dr Scribble's personality image, sort of like a "naughty kid making trouble" behavior, which also reflects the rhapsody of his other self.Mr Doodle calls his style "Graffiti Spaghetti" subverting the traditional graffiti composition and filling every inch of creative space with lines. His works have bright colors and simple lines, through his perspective, he hopes that the audience can look upon the message he wants to convey in a relaxed and humorous way. In his graffiti world, his characters are vivid. He created a brand-new visual phenomenon, improvised brushstrokes are so iconic with ever- increasing and densely layout of characters, objects and patterns, demonstrating his view of the universe. In 2019, Mr Doodle created a series of graffiti which transformed from the world's famous paintings, reinterpreting the works from those masters in art history.

Another wonderful large-scale work "Fire" forms one of the elements from Mr Doodle's "Universe" series. The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle once said there are four elements which make up the universe: Earth, Water, Air and Fire, which are indeed the same four elements needed for biological life: Soil, Water, Air and Sunlight. Mr Doodle created a series of works in 2019 exactly based on these four elements, where "Fire" is visualised in orange, "Water" obviously is in blue, “Air" is depicted in purple and finally "Earth" is represented in green. Mr Doodle visualises and reinterprets these four crucial yet basic components of the material composition in the world from his unique perspective. All things are made out of fire, yet which is always in the midst of change. "Fire" integrates various humorous elements about fire, such as fire-breathing dinosaurs, volcanoes, campfires and sparks etc., awakening the imaginary friends once lively appeared in one’s mind during childhood, and also can discover the storytelling narrative in his graffiti, conveying his own emotions and a fun- filled worldview. "Water Lily Doodles 1" forms part of the series of Mr Doodle's famous paintings that first appeared in Hong Kong in 2019. It is based on the most iconic work in Impressionism, the series of "Water Lilies" from Monet. The water lilies are inspired by the beautiful landscape of Monet's own garden, through the application of soft and bright colors, the artist presents the lively and vibrant water lily pond during summer. Under the theme of water lilies, Monet made a total of 250 paintings, which are the most representative works in his later years. The water lily theme is transformed into a Doodle-style one-stroke graffiti painting, the canvas is decorated with small creatures in various colors either under the pond or in pure fantasy, adorned with a few burning red flowers among the greenery landscape. Mr Doodle reinterprets his own graffiti art through his unique and novel personal perspective.
Related Info

Modern & Contemporary Art

Ravenel Autumn Auction 2021 Taipei

Sunday, December 5, 2021, 2:00pm