Acrylic on canvas

70 × 50 cm. 27 1/2 × 19 5/8 in.

Signed and dated in English on the reverse

LITERATURE
2019, Mr Doodle Invades Sotheby's Selling Exhibition Catalogue, Sotheby's Hong Kong, Hong Kong
EXHIBITED
6-19 Dec 2019, Mr Doodle Invades Sotheby's Selling Exhibition, Sotheby's Hong Kong S|2 Gallery, Hong Kong

PROVENANCE
6-19 Dec 2019, Mr Doodle Invades Sotheby's Selling Exhibition, No. 14
Acquired directly by present private Asian collector from the above

Catering the World with Doodle Spaghetti, Food of Beauty and Love
Mr Doodle's Gorgeous Space

“The shape I paint will naturally lead to another, and end up in tangled spaghetti. If you let it go, it will freely flow on the plane. It is like a creation wrapping objects and walls, which really fascinates me.”
——Mr Doodle

The 29-year-old British artist Mr Doodle, whose real name is Sam Cox, has shown his artistic talent since the age of nine, when he filled the bedroom with paper tissues covered with graffiti. He has been releasing artwork under the name of Mr Doodle since 2018 and has gained 2.7 million fans on Instagram in four years. He calls his works “graffiti spaghetti”, in which he adopts clear and bright lines to paint the closely connected imaginary characters and scenes along a stream of consciousness like an infinite plate of spaghetti inspired by the magic of art. In recent years, he has held many solo exhibitions, including the Doodle World grand exhibition at ARA Art Centre in Seoul in 2018 and Doodle Tokyo solo exhibition at ANSI Art Museum in Japan in 2019. He was additionally invited by Fendi and Adidas to launch the joint fashion products. This spring auction will present two works completed in 2019. Firstly, the large-scale Untitled-1 (Lot 26) is a significant work created by Mr Doodle at The Taipei International Art Fair that year which attracted many audiences on the spot and media coverage. The other work is Doodling Across the Alps (Lot 25) , which is a tribute to the world's most famous paintings at Mr Doodle Invades Sotheby's Selling Exhibition.

Ecstasy and Fantasy: A Stroke Travelling Through Time and Space

Mr Doodle's graffiti work can be divided into two branches: black and white as the main body and coloured. For the former, he expresses his most complicated and richest vision through the most minimalist combination of black and white. He has recently published a three-year project of painting the black-and-white graffiti inside and outside the two-story home in the UK. His passion for insisting on art throughout his life made him appear on BBC News, highlighting the significance of black-and-white graffiti in his creation. Untitled-1 at this auction is a rare work which was finished based on the artist's magical sense of consciousness and widest creativity: Mr Doodle directly stroked the white canvas up and down by the confident and smooth brush There is a rarely-seen self-portrait of Mr Doodle at the right of the painting, instantly recognizable in a suit, a cute bow tie, the iconic Afro-style hair and the funny exaggerated expression. The painting brush in his hand is like a magic stick bursting out tremendous energy, creating the whole graffiti world for a second. In the painted world, everything has spirits. Aliens walk among the earth people driving cars or holding umbrellas. The elves with wings encounter the robots riding a turtle. With its long legs, TV is running and spreading the energy of love. The monocular monster, and anthropomorphic animals… Various forms of life and the living signs blend here, building a busy, vital world just like our real world. More interestingly, this painting shows the intersection of past and present, here and there. Sometimes it seems that we come to the prosperous urban avenue in London, whilst sometimes we turn to see the mystic Egyptian pyramids or leap to outer space. Following the artist's lines, our imagination will also break the boundaries of two-dimension space and rush into the infinite universe.

Graffiti in the World-Famous Painting, Funny and Innovative Interpretations

Doodling Across the Alps turns out to be Mr Doodle's humorous homage to the French classical artist Jacques-Louis David's 1805 masterpiece Napoleon Crossing the Alps. David's painting is a classical heroic portrait of Napoleon, depicting him crossing the Pass of Saint Bernard before the Battle of Marengo. In the original painting, the gray background suggests a pre-war tension, against which the French troops advance in order and the imposing subject, Napoleon, rides a horse and raises his hand as if pledging victory. According to the historians, Napoleon's trip was not overcast and he was mounted on a donkey instead of a horse, while David painted so to present the spirit of heroism and exaggerate the solemn atmosphere. However, in Mr Doodle's world, seriousness is not a necessity. He honestly recreates the historical moment, painting the blue sky and Napoleon on a donkey, still imposing but with a lovely twist. The round lines of black ink, light blue and white represent the classical scene on the sky-blue background. The little donkey at the centre happily raises its front hooves and confidently faces the sky. Napoleon in his military cap looks grave, his lips pressed into a line, and with one hand holding the rein whilst another pointing to the sky, embodying him as a grand general commanding the whole situation. The mountains beneath him seem to come alive, showing their happy faces. Birds chirp loudly and clearly as if they are cheering for the troops. The surrounding elves are presenting their muscles, clenching their fists, or galloping their horses to push the feverish spirit to the climax. Mr Doodle subverts the dogmatic heroic depiction of the monarch in ancient times, narrowing the distance between historical figures and us. The work highlights the side of humanity and revives the serious classical painting, endowing it with fun and childlike innocence.

Price estimate:
HKD: 220,000 – 320,000
USD: 28,000 – 40,800

Auction Result:
HKD: 420,000