Margaret Keane Princess of the East Signed Serigraph on Canvas 1982 Big Eyes

Margaret D. H. Keane (born Margaret Doris Hawkins, American, 1927-2022). "Princess of the East" serigraph on canvas, 1982. Edition 91 of 500. Hand-signed at lower right. Gallery stamp, edition number, artist copyright, and inventory number on verso. A limited edition serigraph on textured canvas by Margaret Keane, titled "Princess of the East," number 91 from an edition of 500. A small girl sits against a burnished gold ground. Her enormous blue-black eyes, the hallmark of the artist, fill much of her pale, solemn face. Black hair falls in two loose pigtails over a rose-pink kimono patterned with faint butterflies. The kimono is cinched by a striped coral and plum obi, and a long sash spills behind her in translucent folds. Her hands rest in her lap around a pink folding fan, and a narrow band of white floor anchors the composition. The canvas texture shows through the printed surface, giving it something of a painting's presence. It is set within a dark velvet liner and an ornate gilt frame with scrolling foliate and shell ornament. Margaret Doris Hawkins was born in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1927. A mastoid operation at age two permanently damaged her hearing, and she learned to read faces closely, especially eyes, to follow what people said. She drew constantly as a child, took classes at the Watkins Institute at ten, and later studied at the Traphagen School of Design in New York. In the 1950s she settled in San Francisco, where her paintings of children, women, and animals with enormous, luminous eyes found a mass audience. Her husband, Walter Keane, was a gifted promoter who sold the work as his own, and she stayed silent for roughly a decade. The paintings spread through galleries, celebrity commissions, prints, and souvenirs. Critics were scornful, though Andy Warhol was a notable defender. She left Walter in 1964 and moved to Hawaii with her daughter, Jane. There she remarried, and in 1970 she publicly claimed authorship of the work. Walter did not appear for a promised paint-off in San Francisco's Union Square. In 1986 she won a defamation suit in a Honolulu court, where she painted a big-eyed child in under an hour while Walter declined to lift a brush. The $4 million award was later overturned, but the verdict established her authorship. She was baptized as a Jehovah's Witness in 1972, and her later paintings grew brighter in mood. Tim Burton's 2014 film Big Eyes renewed interest in her story, and she received a lifetime achievement award at the LA Art Show in 2018. She died at her home in Napa, California, on June 26, 2022, at the age of 94. A Certificate of Authenticity will accompany all winning bids. Item # 205500

Estimate:$900

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