“I was hooked. I was young and quite poor at the time, and while Avery’s prices in those days were still a laugh, I could afford only one painting. I chose a canvas of two sprawled figures – one ghostly white, the other Avery blue, on a brown field – and went industriously back to my desk to write another play so that I could get some more.” — Edward Albee, Milton Avery —

Purchased directly from Milton Avery during a visit to the artist’s home in New York City, Two Nudes exemplifies the careful balance of form and color that Avery achieved during the mature period of his career (estimate $400/600,000). As in the best examples of his work, here Avery reduces compositional elements into their most simplified forms, ultimately synthesizing representation with abstraction. These daring aesthetic ideas are also evident in 1960’s Meditation, a work that displays the striking luminosity the artist created by layering thin washes of pigment on the canvas in large color areas (estimate $2/3 million). The work, prominently displayed in the center of Albee’s Tribeca loft, is among the largest the artist created and attests to the influence Avery’s bold consideration of color played on Post-War painters such as Adolph Gottlieb and Mark Rothko.

A rare early work by Marc Chagall, Portrait de la soeur de l'artiste depicts one of the artist's sisters and represents a significant time in his career when he was a new resident of Saint Petersburg (estimate $1.5/2 million). The strong bold lines and the proximity of the objects and the sitter are all characteristic of the Jack Diamonds group and the Neo-Primitivists Natalia Goncharova and Ilya Mashkov – two artistic movements taking place in Russia at the time of Chagall’s residency.

“These paintings dance and prance and sweep and swerve and shout in their enthusiasm. All is exuberance – the great arcs of paint, the astonishing juxtapositions of color. It is not a mindless outpouring, of course – intellectual control is behind the free spirit in every canvas. What it is, most precisely, is the joyous outpouring of a major artist who is sure of her gift and is happy to share it.” — Edward Albee, Lee Krasner —

Edward Albee’s adoration for Lee Krasner and appreciation for her work are apparent in his writings on the artist. Untitled, signed and dated 1964, marked a period in her life of spiritual renewal (estimate $120/180,000). Marked by vivid colors and feathery brushwork, the light, transparent composition encapsulates the calligraphic aesthetic that became her calling card.

Another American artist that Albee respected greatly was John McLaughlin, who has three works featured in the sale, two of which were recently exhibited in the artist’s retrospective at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Inspired by Kazimir Malevich and Japanese literati painters from the 14th and 15th centuries, McLaughlin’s practice centered upon reducing abstract painting to the essential elements of form, color and line and creating evocative paintings that defied fixed meaning. V-1957 captures this pared-back aesthetic (estimate $80/120,000).

Edward Albee’s preference for non-decorative, abstract art is evoked in Wassily Kandinsky’s Weiss Auf Schwarz (White on Black) (estimate $800,000/1.2 million). Painted in 1930 while he was teaching at the Bauhaus – notable for its artistic cohesion amongst its faculty and students – the work is the result of years of experimentation in abstract forms and geometric compositions. In fact, this dense and energetic arrangement of squares and rectangles is one of the few oils Kandinsky painted in the exclusive color palette of black and white.

Contemporary works of Abstraction are abundant in the collection. In addition to John McLaughlin, Edward Albee acquired a number of works by Albert Eugene Gallatin and Charles Green Shaw, including New York World's Fair and Conception respectively (estimate $40/60,000 and $20/30,000 respectively). Both members of Abstract American Artists, these two artists were crucial to the development of abstraction in the United States. As significant players in this artistic space, and representative of the Edward Albee Collection, works by Gallatin and Shaw hung in places of prominence in his Tribeca loft.