10 things to know about Milton Avery

Staff | Christie’s | 17th May 2021

Avery was far too good an artist to be forgotten but not good enough to be great. He adored Matisse and was adored in turn by Rothko who found inspiration in Avery’s exquisite sense of colour. Though he helped inspire colour field paintings in the 1960’s, Avery was committed to figuration. And his figures are just not that communicative – “ideograms” says one critic. Once abstraction took off, it made his representational work look old hat. He was eclipsed.