Los Angeles–based artist Christina Quarles paints bodies that are subjected not only to the weight and gravity of the physical world but also to the pleasures and pressures of the social realm. Untangling the complexities of race and gender through her dynamic explorations of the human body, Christina Quarles has emerged as one of the leading figurative painters of her generation.

In her large-scale paintings, entwined bodies are set against abstract backgrounds, their faces obscured, and skin rendered in a kaleidoscope of vibrant colors. Seeking to counter the established binary categorization of race, gender, and sexuality, Quarles erases traditional gender and racial qualifiers by fragmenting, convulsing, and stretching her subjects until they reach the brink of dissolving into entirely abstract forms. Leaving large swaths of canvas unpainted, Quarles also invites the viewer to complete her unresolved pictures, further investigating this notion of ambiguity and identity.

Born in Chicago in 1985, Quarles moved following her parents’ divorce to Los Angeles in 1991: she still lives and works there today. After attending the Los Angeles High School for the Arts, she graduated from Hampshire College in 2007, where she studied philosophy and critical race theory. She found language a limiting way to approach thinking about identity and returned to making art, eventually earning an MA in painting from Yale School of Art in 2016. Her work has received rising acclaim ever since.

Practical Information

Christina Quarles
American (Born 1985)
Category: Ultra-Contemporary

Christina Quarles has been in the 2022 Venice Biennale. The focus of numerous solo and group shows – and notably the subject of a critically acclaimed exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago in 2021 – Quarles’ work will also be included in The Milk of Dreams, Cecilia Alemani’s exhibition at the Central Pavilion of the 2022 Venice Biennale.

Public Collections

Christina Quarles’ paintings are housed in acclaimed public collections, including Centre Pompidou in Paris, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, Hirschhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden in Washington D.C., Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, and Tate Modern in London.

Museum Exhibitions

Quarles was prominently featured in the 2020 Whitechapel Gallery group show Radical Figures: Painting in the New Millennium, and the following year held solo exhibitions at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, and the South London Gallery.

Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago

Gallery Representation

HAUSER & WIRTH

Christina Quarles – Come In From An Endless Place – Hauser & Wirth (hauserwirth.com)

Artist Website

www.christinaquarles.com

PART I: SUMMARY

Auction Market Overview

2025 AUCTION STATISTICS
Turnover: USD 136,144
– 93% vs. 2024
# Lots sold: 1
Sell-through Rate: 100%

Highest Price Achieved at Auction:
USD 4,527,000
(19 May 2022)

Auction Summary

2025 Auction Highlights

Only 1 lot sold at auction in 2025. Over it & Under it, a painting dated 2017, sold at Christie’s, in London, on 16 October 205, for GBP 101,600 (USD 136,145).

2024 Auction Highlights

5 lots sold at auction in 2024 for a total turnover of USD 1,955,692. With one lot failing to sell, the sell-through rate is 83%. The highest price was achieved at Sotheby’s in New-York on 13 May 2024, when Cut to Ribbons, a painting dated 2019 sold for USD 762,000.

2024 Top 3 Lots

2 lots sold for more than USD 500,000, generating a cumulative turnover of USD 1,417,200, representing 72.5% of the total turnover for 2024.

2023 Auction Highlights

5 lots sold at auction in 2023 for a total turnover of USD 2,400,626. With no lot failing to sell, the sell-through rate is 100%. The highest price was achieved at Phillips in London on 13 October 2023, when Lil’ Dapple Do Ya, a painting dated 2020 sold for GBP 508,000 (USD 618,908).

2023 Top 3 Lots

4 lots sold for more than USD 500,000, generating a cumulative turnover of USD 2,172,026, representing 90.5% of the total turnover for 2023.

2022 Auction Highlights

9 lots sold at auction in 2022 for a total turnover of USD 10,692,697. With no lot failing to sell, the sell-through rate is 100%. The highest price was achieved at Sotheby’s in New-York on 19 May 2022 when Night Fell Upon US Up On Us, a painting dated 2019 sold for USD 4,527,000.

2022 Top 3 Lots

2 lots sold for more than USD 1 million, generating a cumulative turnover of USD 6,119,750, representing 57.2% of the total turnover for 2022.

Top Lots

#1. Night Fell Upon Us Up On Us, 2019

Sotheby’s New-York: 19 May 2022
Estimated: USD 600,000 – 800,000
USD 4,527,000

Night Fell Upon Us Up On Us | The Now Evening Auction | 2022 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Night Fell Upon Us Up On Us, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
84×72 inches (213.4 x 182.9 cm)
Signed Christina Quarles, titled Night Fell Upon Us Up On Us and dated 2019 (on the reverse)

#2. Bits n’ Pieces, 2019

Sotheby’s New-York: 17 November 2022
Estimated: USD 600,000 – 800,000
USD 1,592,750

Bits n’ Pieces | The Now Evening Auction | 2022 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Bits n’ Pieces, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
72×60 inches (182.9 x 152.4 cm)
Signed, titled Bits n’ Pieces and dated 2019 (on the reverse)

#3. Even in tha Evenin’, 2019

Christie’s London: 12 October 2022
Estimated: GBP 400,000 – 600,000
GBP 856,800 / USD 971,869

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985) (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Even in tha Evenin’, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
52×50 inches (132×127 cm)
Signed, titled and dated ‘Christina Quarles 2019 “EVEN IN THA EVENIN'” (on the reverse)

PART II: AUCTION RESULTS

2026 Upcoming Lots

COMING SOON

2025 Auction Results

Only 1 lot sold at auction in 2025. Over it & Under it, a painting dated 2017, sold at Christie’s, in London, on 16 October 205, for GBP 101,600 (USD 136,145).

Over it & Under it, 2017

Christie’s London: 16 October 2025
Estimated: GBP 100,000 – 150,000
GBP 101,600 / USD 136,145

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985), Over it & Under it | Christie’s

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Over it & Under it, 2017
Acrylic on canvas
60×48 inches (152.5 x 121.8 cm)
Signed, titled and dated ‘Christina Quarles 2017 “OVER IT & UNDER IT”‘ (on the reverse)

2024 Auction Results

5 lots sold at auction in 2024 for a total turnover of USD 1,955,692. With one lot failing to sell, the sell-through rate is 100%. The highest price was achieved at Sotheby’s in New-York on 13 May 2024, when Cut to Ribbons, a painting dated 2019 sold for USD 762,000. 2 lots sold for more than USD 500,000, generating a cumulative turnover of USD 1,417,200, representing 72.5% of the total turnover for 2024.

2024 Top 3 Lots

#1. Cut to Ribbons, 2019

Sotheby’s New-York: 13 May 2024
Estimated: USD 600,000 – 800,000
USD 762,000

Cut to Ribbons | The Now Evening Auction | 2024 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (b. 1985)
Cut to Ribbons, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
95×55 inches (243.8 x 139.7 cm)
Signed, titled and dated 2019 (on the reverse)

#2. Don’t They Know? It’s the End of tha World, 2020

Christie’s New-York: 14 May 2024
Estimated: USD 500,000 – 700,000
USD 655,200

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B.1985), Don’t They Know? It’s the End of tha World | Christie’s (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B.1985)
Don’t They Know? It’s the End of tha World, 2020
Acrylic on canvas
77×96 inches (195.6 x 243.8 cm)
Signed, titled and dated ‘Christina Quarles 2020 “Don’t They Know? It’s the End of tha World”‘ (on the reverse)

USD 500,000

#3. Then Tha Dust Settles, 2017

Christie’s London: 7 March 2024
Estimated: GBP 200,000 – 300,000
GBP 226,800 / USD 287,582

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985), Then Tha Dust Settles | Christie’s (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Then Tha Dust Settles, 2017
Acrylic on canvas
56×50 inches (142×127 cm)
Signed, titled and dated ‘C Quarles 2017 “THEN THA DUST SETTLES” (on the reverse)

#4. We Woke in Mourning Jus Tha Same, 2017

Christie’s Hong-Kong: 26 September 2024
Estimated: HKD 2,000,000 – 4,000,000
HKD 1,260,000 / USD 161,830

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985), We Woke in Mourning Jus Tha Same | Christie’s (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
We Woke in Mourning Jus Tha Same, 2017
Acrylic on canvas
60×48 inches (152.4 x 121.9 cm)
Signed with the artist’s signature, titled, and dated
‘2017 “WE WOKE UP IN MOURNING JUS THA SAME”‘ (on the reverse)

#6. ALL THA STARS MAN, THA STARS LOOK BEAUTIFUL TONITE, 2016

Christie’s Hong-Kong: 27 September 2024
Estimated: HKD 700,000 – 900,000
HKD 693,000 / USD 89,080

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985), ALL THA STARS MAN, THA STARS LOOK BEAUTIFUL TONITE | Christie’s

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
ALL THA STARS MAN, THA STARS LOOK BEAUTIFUL TONITE, 2016
Acrylic on canvas
49 1/2 x 40 inches (125.8 x 101.6 cm)
Signed, titled and dated ‘2016 “ALL THA STARS MAN, THA STARS LOOK BEAUTIFUL TONITE”’
(on the reverse)

2023 Auction Results

5 lots sold at auction in 2023 for a total turnover of USD 2,400,626. With no lot failing to sell, the sell-through rate is 100%. The highest price was achieved at Phillips in London on 13 October 2023, when Lil’ Dapple Do Ya, a painting dated 2020 sold for GBP 508,000 (USD 618,908). 4 lots sold for more than USD 500,000, generating a cumulative turnover of USD 2,172,026, representing 90.5% of the total turnover for 2023.

2023 Top 3 Lots

#1. Lil’ Dapple Do Ya, 2020

Phillips London: 13 October 2023
Estimated: GBP 450,000 – 550,000
GBP 508,000 / USD 618,908

#2. It’s Only Night Twice a Day, 2018

Sotheby’s Hong-Kong: 5 April 2023
Estimated: HKD 3,200,000 – 4,500,000
HKD 4,064,000 / USD 517,714

CHRISTINA QUARLES (b. 1985)
It’s Only Night Twice a Day, 2018
Acrylic on canvas
48×60 inches (121.9 x 152.4 cm)
Signed, titled and dated 2018 on the reverse

#3. Our Eyes Our Open/Are Eyes Are Open, 2017

Phillips Hong-Kong: 30 March 2023
Estimated: HKD 1,600,000 – 2,600,000
HKD 4,064,000 / USD 517,714

Christina Quarles – 20th Century & Cont… Lot 2 March 2023 | Phillips

#4. Day ‘Fore Night, 2019

Christie’s Hong-Kong: 28 November 2023
Estimated: HKD 1,500,000 – 2,500,000
HKD 4,032,000 / USD 517,644

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985) (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Day ‘Fore Night, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
50 x 42 1/8 inches (127 x 106.7 cm)
Signed with artist’s signature, titled and dated ‘2019 “DAY ‘FORE NIGHT”‘ (on the reverse)

#5. Floored, 2017

Phillips New-York: 14 November 2023
Estimated: USD 250,000 – 350,000
USD 228,600

Christina Quarles – 20th Century & … Lot 54 November 2023 | Phillips

2022 Auction Results

9 lots sold at auction in 2022 for a total turnover of USD 10,692,697. With no lot failing to sell, the sell-through rate is 100%. The highest price was achieved at Sotheby’s in New-York on 19 May 2022 when Night Fell Upon US Up On Us, a painting dated 2019 sold for USD 4,527,000. 2 lots sold for more than USD 1 million, generating a cumulative turnover of USD 6,119,750, representing 57.2% of the total turnover for 2022.

2022 Top 3 Lots

#1. Night Fell Upon Us Up On Us, 2019

Sotheby’s New-York: 19 May 2022
Estimated: USD 600,000 – 800,000
USD 4,527,000

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Night Fell Upon Us Up On Us, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
84×72 inches (213.4 x 182.9 cm)
Signed Christina Quarles, titled Night Fell Upon Us Up On Us and dated 2019 (on the reverse)

#2. Bits n’ Pieces, 2019

Sotheby’s New-York: 17 November 2022
Estimated: USD 600,000 – 800,000
USD 1,592,750

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Bits n’ Pieces, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
72×60 inches (182.9 x 152.4 cm)
Signed, titled Bits n’ Pieces and dated 2019 (on the reverse)

#3. Even in tha Evenin’, 2019

Christie’s London: 13 October 2022
Estimated: GBP 400,000 – 600,000
GBP 856,800 / USD 971,869

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985), Even in tha Evenin’ | Christie’s (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Even in tha Evenin’, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
52×50 inches (132×127 cm)
Signed, titled and dated ‘Christina Quarles 2019 “EVEN IN THA EVENIN'” (on the reverse)

#4. Held Together, 2019

Christie’s New-York: 30 November 2022
Estimated: HKD 6,000,000 – 8,000,000
HKD 6,930,000 / USD 887,892

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985) (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Held Together, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
54×68 inches (137.2 x 172.7 cm)

#5. A Shaddow of Whut I Once Was, 2017

Christie’s New-York: 28 September 2022
Estimated: USD 500,000 – 700,000
USD 693,000

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985) (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
A Shaddow of Whut I Once Was, 2017
Acrylic on canvas
48×60 inches (121.9 x 152.4 cm)
Signed, titled and dated (on the reverse)

#6. Push ‘Em Little Daisies, 2019

Sotheby’s New-York: 30 September 2022
Estimated: USD 500,000 – 700,000
USD 630,000

Push ‘Em Little Daisies | Contemporary Curated | 2022 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Push ‘Em Little Daisies, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
50×52 inches (127 x 132.1 cm)
Signed, titled PUSH ‘EM LITTLE DAISIES and dated 2019 (on the verso)

#7. Fallback, Back/Side, 2017

Christie’s New-York: 16 November 2022
Estimated: USD 400,000 – 600,000
USD 604,800

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Fallback, Back/Side, 2017
Acrylic on canvas
56×50 inches (142.2 x 127 cm)
Signed, titled and dated (on the reverse)

#8. Butt Hidden in Lacy Groves (Hell Must Be a Pretty Place, Fire N’ Brimstone All Right…), 2017

Sotheby’s London: 30 June 2022
Estimated: GBP 200,000 – 300,000
GBP 252,800 / USD 428,988

Butt Hidden in Lacy Groves (Hell Must Be a Pretty Place) | Modern & Contemporary Day Auction | 2022 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (b. 1985)
Butt Hidden in Lacy Groves (Hell Must Be a Pretty Place, Fire N’ Brimstone All Right…), 2017
Acrylic on canvas
50×40 inches (127 x 101.6 cm)
Signed, titled and dated 2017 on the reverse

#9. I Can Only Feel Whut Touches Me, 2016

Phillips Hong-Kong: 1 December 2022
Estimated: HKD 900,000 – 1,200,000
HKD 2,772,000 / USD 356,398

Christina Quarles – 20th Century & C… Lot 5 December 2022 | Phillips

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
I Can Only Feel Whut Touches Me, 2016
Acrylic on canvas
77×95.9 inches (195.6 x 243.8 cm)
Signed and dated ‘Christina Quarles 2016’ on the overlap

2021 Auction Results

2 paintings sold in 2021 for a total turnover of USD 1,216,723.

#1. Common Ground (Worlds Apart, Miles Away), 2016

Sotheby’s New-York: 18 November 2021
Estimated: USD 120,000 – 180,000
USD 685,500

Common Ground (Worlds Apart, Miles Away) | The Now Evening Auction | 2021 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Common Ground (Worlds Apart, Miles Away), 2016
Acrylic on canvas
50×40 inches (127 x 101.6 cm)
Signed Christina Quarles twice, titled and dated 2016 (on the reverse)

#2. But Baby, In Here Its Fine, 2015

Christie’s Hong-Kong: 24 May 2021
Estimated: HKD 1,000,000 – 1,000,000
HKD 4,125,000 / USD 531,223

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985) (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
But Baby, In Here Its Fine, 2015
Mixed media on canvas
88 7/8 x 55 1/8 inches (225.7 x 140 cm)
Signed with artist’s signature; dated 2015’ (on the overlap)

PART III: FOCUS

Record Breakers

Bits n’ Pieces, 2019

Sotheby’s New-York: 17 November 2022
Estimated: USD 600,000 – 800,000
USD 1,592,750

Bits n’ Pieces | The Now Evening Auction | 2022 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Bits n’ Pieces, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
72×60 inches (182.9 x 152.4 cm)
Signed, titled Bits n’ Pieces and dated 2019 (on the reverse)

A triad of androgynous bodies converges and convulses in Christina Quarles’s Bits n’ Pieces from 2019, a mesmerizing painting of sensuous ambiguity that reveals itself, as the title suggests, body part by body part. As they unravel from intersecting layers of purple checkerboard and red-yellow plaid patterns, Quarles’s Dionysian figures here visualize a radical fragmentation of corporeal form, at once expressing the inner complexities of identity and countering fixed identifications of race, gender, and sexuality. Bits n’ Pieces typifies the relentless curiosity and innovative technique that has propelled Quarles’ practice to critical acclaim, leading her to a prominent solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago in 2021 inclusion in the prestigious Central Pavilion curated by Cecilia Alemani at the 2022 Venice Biennale, and most recently, her first major New York gallery show at Hauser & Wirth in September 2022. A standout painting from Quarles’s first solo exhibition in China from 2019 to 2020, Every Silver Lining Has Its cloud at Pond Society, Shanghai, Bits n’ Pieces sees the artist’s distinctive forms dissolve and evolve with the viewer’s eye to encapsulate the psychosomatic paradoxes of human identity.

In Bits n’ Pieces, amorphous, phantasmagoric silhouettes bear down on the forefront figure as they lurch towards a sunflower, which seems to surrender to the combined weight of the bodies, its verdant green stem wilting in a parabolic inflection downward. As if grappling with the primal cognitive awareness of their own own physical existence, the figures in Bits n’ Pieces here contort in writhing gestures and serpentine configurations that recall ancient depictions of the human body in agony, such as in the iconic Hellenistic sculpture Laocoön and His Sons. The present work additionally invokes the surrealistic linework of Salvador Dali, the delicate anthropomorphism of Georgia O’Keefe, and in particular, the corporeal sculpture of Louise Bourgeois, whose intensely psychological abstraction of the human form finds resonance in Quarles’s own belief in the fragmented body-in-pieces as the essential disposition of the postmodern somatic experience.

Even in tha Evenin’, 2019

Christie’s London: 12 October 2022
Estimated: GBP 400,000 – 600,000
GBP 856,800 / USD 971,869

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985) (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Even in tha Evenin’, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
52×50 inches (132×127 cm)
Signed, titled and dated ‘Christina Quarles 2019 “EVEN IN THA EVENIN'” (on the reverse)

Bodies and limbs grasp and entwine one another across Christina Quarles’ Even in tha Evenin’, a vivid large-scale canvas from 2019. Quarles draws upon her own experience as a queer, multiracial woman to create polymorphous paintings that explore sensual, shifting states of identity. At least three figures seem to be involved in the present work: one contorts backwards at a right angle as if bounded by the edges of the picture, while a second leans back to meet it in a twisted embrace. A pile-up of hands meet on its arching abdomen, gripping breasts and interlacing fingers. Faces variously described—including a dilute grimace worthy of Francis Bacon, a pink profile in silhouette, and a face whose mouth appears to be an actual lipstick kiss—are framed by the figures’ raised arms. Ranging from slick impasto to sinuous washes of pink and purple and contoured shadings of neon hue, Quarles’ pigment is by turns translucent and opaque, delicate and strident, deployed in a dazzling diversity of techniques. She uses vinyl stencils to mask off some areas—creating a crisp-edged mountainous backdrop—and lets other passages rain drips down the raw canvas. One wedge of black is scored into wavy striations using a comb.

Night Fell Upon Us Up On Us, 2019

Sotheby’s New-York: 19 May 2022
Estimated: USD 600,000 – 800,000
USD 4,527,000

Night Fell Upon Us Up On Us | The Now Evening Auction | 2022 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Night Fell Upon Us Up On Us, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
84×72 inches (213.4 x 182.9 cm)
Signed Christina Quarles, titled Night Fell Upon Us Up On Us and dated 2019 (on the reverse)

A mesmerizing entanglement of indecipherable intertwined figures set against a luminous nightscape, Night Fell Upon Us (Up On Us) is an archetypal example of Christina Quarles’ acclaimed practice. Exploring the complexities of identity, Quarles abstracts her sensuous, dionysian figures, countering established binary categorization of race, gender, and sexuality. Through the fragmentation and convolution of forms, Quarles explores de-racializing and destabilizing orthodox depictions and connotations of the body. In Night Fell Upon Us, Quarles renders the emotional complications of identity unravelling as the viewer’s eyes trace each vibrant form and experimental mark; her figures physically embody the ineffable multiplicity of the self. The present work typifies the relentless curiosity and innovative technique that has propelled Quarles’ practice to critical acclaim and established her as one of the most exciting, pioneering voices in contemporary painting.

Quarles employs experimental and expressive brushwork, capturing a sense of motion almost akin to an Italian Futurist painting. Each position and figure seems to leave an imprint of itself. As the viewer’s gaze follows each straining palm and outstretched appendage to the next, deciphering the delineation between figures becomes senseless. Quarles’ unabating rejection of singular descriptors allows her to capture the intoxicating beauty of ambiguity. With exceptional dexterity and painterly innovation, Quarles encapsulates the non-binary fluid of reality, challenging the viewer to revel in the multiplicity of the universal human experience. In Night Fell Upon Us, Quarles examines the nuanced complexities of the social and psychical experiences of existing within a body, with a partner and within a group. A dynamic energy pulsates through Quarles’ seductively variable brushwork, animating the painting with the endless possibilities unlocked by the figures’ tender intimacy.

Other Paintings

Don’t They Know? It’s the End of tha World, 2020

Christie’s New-York: 14 May 2024
Estimated: USD 500,000 – 700,000
USD 655,200

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B.1985), Don’t They Know? It’s the End of tha World | Christie’s (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B.1985)
Don’t They Know? It’s the End of tha World, 2020
Acrylic on canvas
77×96 inches (195.6 x 243.8 cm)
Signed, titled and dated ‘Christina Quarles 2020 “Don’t They Know? It’s the End of tha World”‘ (on the reverse)

Nude bodies grasp and tangle with one another in Christina Quarles’ Don’t They Know? It’s the End of tha World, a vibrant, animated canvas from 2020. Drawing on her own experience as a queer, multi-racial woman, Quarles paints the ways in which identity is always shifting and evolving. In the present work, limbs beget limbs, bodies beget bodies. The figures are composed primarily of delicate washes of prismatic pigment, and streaks of purple, pink, and bright yellow suggest muscle and blood. This cacophony of movement is framed by two ornate windows, each outfitted with crisp, curlicue tracery that Quarles has rendered using vinyl stencils. Although ostensibly decipherable, paintings such as Don’t They Know? It’s the End of tha World refuse clear conclusions and instead open themselves up to manifold, layered readings.

Although their surface may be two-dimensional, Quarles’ paintings are haptic experiences; they demand to be touched and propose an almost tangible sense of physicality. As the artist has noted, “I use the figure as a way of describing an experience of embodiment” (C. Quarles, quoted in E. McDermott, “All eyes on Christina Quarles, the painter inventing a new figurative language”, Wallpaper, 6 May 2023, online). Under Quarles’ handling, the body is fragmented and ever metamorphosizing; such an approach to representations of existence has its foundations in her undergraduate studies in philosophy. The figures in her paintings are meant to evoke the experience of living inside of a body rather than how it feels to be looked at or to look. “Bodies are occupied by space and patterns in my paintings,” she has said, “collapsing and expanding as they run into shifting contexts” (C. Quarles, quoted in P. Bradford, “Christina Quarles’ Shape-Shifting Figures at Pilar Corrias”, Ocula, 12 October 2023, online).

Salvador Dali, The Great Masturbator, 1929. Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid. © 2024 Salvador Dalí, Fundació Gala-Salvador Dalí  / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: © Alinari Archives / Art Resource, NY. 

Indeed, by through the use of mutation and transformation, Quarles’ paintings suggest that the body can be a site of radical change. Far from fixed or even discernible, these figures are muscular; they swell, warp, and revel in physical and fleshy pleasures. Accordingly, they cannot be contained, and instead are able to rebel against expectation and tradition. This revolt is underscored by the painting’s own materialist, which contains both passages of high finish alongside drips and splatters, clarity and chaos. The doubling and repetition—evidenced in both the image and the title of the present work—is a reminder that art is as vast and undefinable as the lived experienced. Don’t They Know? It’s the End of tha World encourages new visions and new frameworks; it courts unruliness and defiance. It is, unto itself, a defiant image.

Cut to Ribbons, 2019

Sotheby’s New-York: 13 May 2024
Estimated: USD 600,000 – 800,000
USD 762,000

Cut to Ribbons | The Now Evening Auction | 2024 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (b. 1985)
Cut to Ribbons, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
95×55 inches (243.8 x 139.7 cm)
Signed, titled and dated 2019 (on the reverse)

Entrancing in vivid color and visceral form, Cut to Ribbons from 2019 is a stunning example of Christina Quarles’ unparalleled exploration of figurative abstraction. Fragmented and intertwined, the corporeal figures in Cut to Ribbons navigate between virtual and physical realms, denying rigid classifications of gender, race, and sexuality and imparting profound insight into the complexities of inhabiting a human body in the twenty-first century. Cut to Ribbons was notably executed for the exhibition Christina Quarles: In Likeness at The Hepworth Wakefield in 2019-2020, the first solo exhibition by the artist in a European museum. The present work reflects the profound influence that David Hockney’s early paintings have had on artist, a selection of which were on view in the adjoining gallery at The Hepworth Wakefield during her exhibition. Indeed, Quarles’ illustration of water in the lower register, use of unprimed canvas, and abrupt shift of perspectives draw directly from Hockney’s iconic 1960s swimming pool paintings. As in the best of her paintings, the present work exemplifies Quarles’ experimental and expressive brushwork, which captures both a sense of motion and the beauty of ambiguity. Quarles’s gestural lines and technique allow the painting’s forms to flow, contort, and evolve with the viewer. Alluringly depicting a disorganized body in a state of excess, Cut to Ribbons confronts the viewer with a disjunct experience of human embodiment, revealing the triumphant apogee of Quarles’ painterly dexterity and innovation.

In Cut to Ribbons, brilliant hues give shape to two entwined figures contoured by sharp markings and washy, diaphanous brushstrokes. The two figures twist together and overlap across the expanse of the canvas, unraveling into intersecting layers of harlequin checkerboard patterns in yellows, and greens, and pinks. Gestural lines allow the forms to flow, contort, and evolve with the viewer. The bodies are simultaneously weighty and buoyant, bobbing against the serene picture planes while simultaneously stretched and pulled by the downward momentum of attenuated limbs. Entangled feet rest on a bar of brilliant azure and appendages cascade downwards to the bottom of the canvas.

LEFT: SALVADOR DALÍ, THE ROTTING DONKEY, 1928. CENTRE POMPIDOU, PARIS. ART © 2024 SALVADOR DALÍ, FUNDACIÓ GALA-SALVADOR DALÍ, ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY. RIGHT: LOUISE BOURGEOIS, THE ARCH OF HYSTERIA, 1993. PRIVATE COLLECTION, SOLD FOR $5.6 MILLION AT SOTHEBY’S NEW YORK, 2019. ART © 2024 THE EASTON FOUNDATION / LICENSED BY VAGA AT ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY (ARS), NY

In line with the most consummate examples of the artist’s abstract figuration, Cut to Ribbons stratifies the material terrain of the canvas into digitally drafted planes of patterned wallpaper and soft brush strokes which are then displaced by bodily contours. The tripartite division of the canvas blurs the line between medium and picture plane, echoing the floating registers of Mark Rothko’s meditative Color Field paintings, while the patterned swirls of blue and white at the bottom of the canvas superbly evoke David Hockney’s luscious swimming pools, whose expressive use of color and form was a profound influence on Quarles as a child growing up in Los Angeles. The resulting intersection of high-key color, texture, and form in Cut to Ribbons deftly hybridizes physical and digital space, providing a compelling arena for the anonymous figures who are abstracted to almost bare parts to expose the nuances of bodies.

THE PRESENT WORK INSTALLED IN THE ARTIST’S STUDIO. ART © 2024 CHRISTINA QUARLES

Experimental and expressive brushwork radically fragments corporeal form, expressing the inner complexities of identity and countering fixed identifications of race, gender, and sexuality. “I often say that my paintings are portraits of living within a body, rather than portraits of looking onto a body” says the artist. (Christina Quarles in conversation with David Getsy, in Exh. Cat. The Hepworth Wakefield, Christina Quarles: In Likeness, 2019) “What interests me are themes of the sort of fragmentation that happens of yourself when you are in your body and really at a disadvantage in the way of knowing yourself because you know all [your] contradictions, all the ways you exceed or don’t quite fit into these certain categories of identity that we’re placed in.” (Christina Quarles quoted in: Claire Selvin “Christina Quarles on the Intricacies of Figuration and Selfhood” ARTNews, 15 April 2021 (online)) Cut to Ribbons alluringly explores the dichotomies of the self to illuminate the intersection of gender, sexuality and race while underscoring the diversity and complexity of the universal experience.

Then Tha Dust Settles, 2017

Christie’s London: 7 March 2024
Estimated: GBP 200,000 – 300,000
GBP 226,800 / USD 287,582

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985), Then Tha Dust Settles | Christie’s (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Then Tha Dust Settles, 2017
Acrylic on canvas
56×50 inches (142×127 cm)
Signed, titled and dated ‘C Quarles 2017 “THEN THA DUST SETTLES” (on the reverse)

Christina Quarles’s paintings transport us to a realm of peculiarly contorted figures, stretching and reeling in fluid, unfixed movement. Her characters often have elongated torsos, prolonged necks and gangling limbs, as if viewed through a funhouse mirror. Then Tha Dust Settles (2017) is an exemplar of her dynamic practice. Its composition reflects the tangled complexity of human identity and relationships. A nude body sits on the floor, bounded by the corners of the canvas. Its skin is tinged with grey, green, purple and red, redolent of the paintings of Viennese Expressionist Egon Schiele. It leans against the back of a second figure, seeking an intimate connection; this other figure, its head a diaphanous sweep of orange, reaches rangy fingers down the sitter’s thigh. The intimation of a third body appears in graphic, chequered yellow and black, hoisting a vaporous bunch of flowers over its shoulder. Inky slicks of green and blue rain down the painting’s lower reaches. Elsewhere, crisp fields of color are masked off, or areas of raw canvas stained with delicate pigment. In 2017-2018, the work was included in the group exhibition Trigger: Gender as a Tool and a Weapon at the New Museum, New York.

Then Tha Dust Settles is both a capsule of Quarles’ ongoing concerns and a showcase of her astonishing talents. When it appeared in the New Museum’s exhibition in 2017, critic Peter Schjeldahl highlighted Quarles’ work as a highlight. ‘The wholes and parts of bodies in Quarles’s cheerfully orgiastic pictures entangle in alternating styles of line, stroke, stain, and smear’, he wrote (P. Schjeldahl, ‘Art World as Safe Space’, The New Yorker, 2 October 2017). He also compared them to the flowing, liquefied works of Arshile Gorky and Willem de Kooning: American artists who similarly danced on the borderline between figuration and abstraction. Quarles often works freehand, composing her improvisatory paintings as she goes alone. Then Tha Dust Settles captures the artist at her ingenious best, attuned to the flux and spontaneity of life itself.

Floored, 2017

Phillips New-York: 14 November 2023
Estimated: USD 250,000 – 350,000
USD 228,600

Christina Quarles – 20th Century & … Lot 54 November 2023 | Phillips

Amorphous, dripping body parts spill across a yellow and black checkered floor in Christina Quarles’ Floored. Created in 2017, the year of the artist’s first ever solo exhibition, which launched her to widespread critical acclaim, Floored displays Quarles’ signature, undefinable bodies, bending and intersecting across a spliced picture plane, in a ripe visual synthesis of the multiple, shifting aspects of the self. Subverting the trope of the female nude in art history, Quarles’ paintings upend our preconceived notions of race, gender, and space. In Floored, it is challenging to discern how many figures are splayed across the floor—and which limbs belong to which person. Quarles eschews anatomical reality in order to paint “portraits of living within a body,” as she says; touching, feeling, moving—the seven-fingered hand stroking the face at upper left, for instance, registers how it feels to be touched from within the body, feeling fingers curve and brush against skin.

Egon Schiele, Kneeling Girl, Resting on Both Elbows, 1917. Leopold Museum, Vienna.

The artist relishes the ambiguity of her figures, and the way in which her compositions encourage the viewer look closely and puzzle out each body. “I like to play with the desire I think we all have to complete the image, and whenever possible, to complete it into a figure,” she explains. The viewer assumes, based on the presence of recognizable features, like the hands, feet, and breasts in Floored, that Quarles’ forms are all body parts; Quarles hopes to introduce just enough ambiguity to her compositions to “nudge people enough in the direction of questioning their initial assumptions.” The division of space in Floored, too, adds to the perceived ambiguity of the composition. As Quarles shares, she begins each painting with the fragmented shapes and abstract brushstrokes that will become her figures. Once these shapes are “fleshed out” on canvas, she pauses, photographs the work, and then takes it into Adobe Illustrator, where she digitally draws over the photograph to place “the patterns and the planes and the areas that really start to interrupt the figure.”^vi After this digital intervention, Quarles returns to the canvas to complete the work; the splicing of her figures across planes, then, is quite literally built into her painting process, as she shifts from canvas, to computer screen, and back again. The figure(s) of Floored exist in three planes of reality at once—the pink sky, the checkered floor, and a murky, subterranean layer of hazy yellow and grey.

Mickalene Thomas, Racquel Reclining Wearing Purple Jumpsuit, 2016. Private Collection. Artwork: © 2023 Mickalene Thomas / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York 

Quarles’ ambitions to upend assumptions about figurative painting are inherently antipatriarchal, antiracist, and queer. With a traditional canon dominated by paintings of nude women by white men, Quarles’ queer gaze, like that of Mickalene Thomas or Jenna Gribbon, calls into question the power dynamics of her figurative representations. The practice of figure drawing—which Quarles has participated in since the age of twelve—relies on direct observation and rewards the artist who is best able to see the physical body before them. Quarles’ figures, with their twisting limbs, extra fingers, and blue-grey shadows, overlap and intersect in ways that defy any sense of figural reality; these are “bodies that resist a fixing gaze.”

Lil’ Dapple Do Ya, 2020

Phillips London: 13 October 2023
Estimated: GBP 450,000 – 550,000
GBP 508,000 / USD 618,908

Christina Quarles – 20th Century & Co… Lot 8 October 2023 | Phillips

Created in 2020 in direct response to the sudden limitations on movement and interpersonal contact brought about by the global pandemic, Christina Quarles’ Lil’ Dapple Do Ya is a visceral and affecting psychological portrait of our desire for human intimacy, and the complex experience of being in our bodies. A tangle of limbs, hands, buttocks, and breasts, two bodies violently collide and melt into one another, the whole composition charged with a searing sensuality and eroticism further amplified by the shocks of hot pink and acid yellows that offset fleshier tones. Although her fluid treatment of paint, and elongated, soft forms visually evoke the Surrealist visions of Salvador Dalí, Quarles’ compositions are rooted in the complexities of being in her own body, rather than occupying the realm of dreams and fantasy.

First presented in her 2020 solo show I Won’t Fear Tumbling or Falling / If We’ll be Joined in Another World alongside 8 other works created in the same intense and uncertain period, Lil’ Dapple Do Ya demonstrates the remarkable range of Quarles’ mark-making. Slipping seamlessly between painterly styles and techniques, we see smoother and more sculptural contour lines running up against more precise patterned planes, dreamy washes of color suddenly interrupted by more heavily impastoed areas, the artist layering paint over itself ‘to evoke woozy double vision, offset by smears of bubble-gum-pink paint, bared buttocks, and tentacular black limbs.’

It’s Only Night Twice a Day, 2018

Sotheby’s Hong-Kong: 5 April 2023
Estimated: HKD 3,200,000 – 4,500,000
HKD 4,064,000 / USD 517,714

Christina Quarles 克里斯蒂娜・夸爾斯 | It’s Only Night Twice a Day 僅於晚上，一日兩回 | 50th Anniversary Contemporary Evening Auction | 2023 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (b. 1985)
It’s Only Night Twice a Day, 2018
Acrylic on canvas
48×60 inches (121.9 x 152.4 cm)
Signed, titled and dated 2018 on the reverse

Presenting a mesmerizing tangle of shapes and colors, Christina Quarles’ It’s Only Night Twice A Day is a sensuous study of human entanglement. Working with vibrant and phosphorescent hues that run and bleed into the canvas, Quarles’ textured portrayal of the human body is barely contained within the confines of the canvas. Exploring the complexities of identity and embodiment, Quarles’ figures bare an uncanny inside-out quality, her surreal composition placing a mass of discombobulated anatomical elements within a mesmerizing warped space. Laid out betwixt two spaces of light and dark, the figure of It’s Only Night Twice A Day is formed of knotted features which bend and fold, undulating in sensuous peaks and troughs. Crafting the body as a vessel to contain the nuances of the human experience, Quarles’s distinctive feel for the visceral strangeness of the physical experience is on full display in the present work.

Quarles’ unique title selection is an important part of her working practice. As the artist explains, “The language I use with the work turns into something that is completed by the imagination or a recollection. I feel that this opens the work up to the viewer’s interpretation or memory of that word, which is very specific to whomever reads it, which is what I love about incorporating language into the paintings” (Christina Quarles quoted in: Ibid.). The uncanny title of It’s Only Night Twice A Day speaks to the ambiguity of the human memory, and of knowing and unknowing ourselves, a theme which continues into Quarles’ detailed and sensitive treatment of the body. Her wondrously complex figures resist fixity and conventional modes of representation, moving through time and space, constantly flowing and evolving. Beginning her process with primordial line drawings of manifold human forms, Quarles continues to paint digitally rendered backgrounds to create illusionistic environments surrounding her figures with the guide of stencils or vinyl plotters. Painting from memory as opposed to live models or photographs, the figures of the present work are fixed with a sense of timelessness, existing neither within the day or the night. Entrancing yet disorienting, the resulting intersection of color, texture, and form gives shape to bodies contoured by sharp markings and washy, diaphanous brushstrokes. In denying the viewer any clear or tangible attribute to cling to, Quarles’ imparts a profound insight into the complexities of what it means to inhabit a human body in the 21^st century.

Our Eyes Our Open/Are Eyes Are Open, 2017

Phillips Hong-Kong: 30 March 2023
Estimated: HKD 1,600,000 – 2,600,000
HKD 4,064,000 / USD 517,714

Christina Quarles – 20th Century & Cont… Lot 2 March 2023 | Phillips

CHRISTINA QUARLES
Our Eyes Our Open/Are Eyes Are Open, 2017
Acrylic on canvas
50×42 inches (127 x 106.7 cm)

Intertwined with fluidity, rhythm and poise, the bodies in Christina Quarles’s figures are often enclosed within graphical space, through a windowpane or across patterned tabletops. The torsos, faces and limbs of her entangled protagonists emerge from a patchwork of colour, pattern, and perspectives, giving us charged compositions that create an almost physical tension with the viewer.

Quarles’s works feature abstract, line-drawn, and fragmented bodies that aim to visually represent the complexities of how we all inhabit multiple identities, selves, and forms. Informed by her own identity as a mixed-race, queer woman, Quarles investigates the universal experience of being in a body, as well as how race, gender, and sexuality intersect to form complex identities. First unveiled at a group exhibition Abstract/Not Abstract organized by Gagosian and Jeffrey Deitch in 2017, then subsequently exhibited at the Berkley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive in 2018, Our Eyes Our Open/Are Eyes Are Open presents bodies in a state of flux or transformation – forms are ambiguous and fluid, melting and morphing into each other.

I Can Only Feel Whut Touches Me, 2016

Phillips Hong-Kong: 1 December 2022
Estimated: HKD 900,000 – 1,200,000
HKD 2,772,000 / USD 356,398

Christina Quarles – 20th Century & C… Lot 5 December 2022 | Phillips

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
I Can Only Feel Whut Touches Me, 2016
Acrylic on canvas
77×95.9 inches (195.6 x 243.8 cm)
Signed and dated ‘Christina Quarles 2016’ on the overlap

A sense of touch permeates the composition of I Can Only Feel Whut Touches Me, as the foreground yellow figure reaches beyond the frame of the canvas by holding out a single finger, evocative of a tentative touch. Caught in a moment of intimacy, the bathing figures on the right intertwine as they nestle within a bubbling pool of fuchsia waters, whilst a warm orange sun settles between the mountains in the background.

Often inspired by or directly quoting poetry and song lyrics, the titles of Quarles’ works are integral to her practice. Almost always featuring an alternate phonetic spelling of words – such as in the current work where ‘whut’ stands in for ‘what’ – Quarles’ titles invite the viewer to multiple readings of the word or phrase, underpinned with the context of socio-political connotations of spelling. As the artist explains: ‘The language I use with the work turns into something that is completed by the imagination or a recollection. I feel that this opens the work up to the viewer’s interpretation or memory of that word, which is very specific to whomever reads it, which is what I love about incorporating language into the paintings.’

Held Together, 2019

Christie’s New-York: 30 November 2022
Estimated: HKD 6,000,000 – 8,000,000
HKD 6,930,000 / USD 887,892

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985) (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Held Together, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
54×68 inches (137.2 x 172.7 cm)

Fallback, Back/Side, 2017

Christie’s New-York: 16 November 2022
Estimated: USD 400,000 – 600,000
USD 604,800

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985) (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Fallback, Back/Side, 2017
Acrylic on canvas
56×50 inches (142.2 x 127 cm)
Signed, titled and dated (on the reverse)

A refreshing new voice in the art market for her surrealist figurations and bold compositional depth, Christina Quarles’ Fallback, Back/Side arrives to market following the artist’s exceptional praise at the 2022 Venice Biennale. Commanding in scale at a life-size five feet by four feet, the present example is an immersive exploration of figuration and the meeting of bodies. The artist’s astonishing proficiency in color and form creates a surreal world in and of itself, one within which bodies are comprised of abstracted lines and faces are rendered down to simple lines and sunset hues. Fallback, Back/Side is both a portrait and a fairy tale captured whimsically within a sensuous dreamscape.

Illustrated are two figures whose limbs are intertwined in an embrace so intimately that the series of overlapping forms confuse a clear distinction between each individual. Spidery hands and abstracted faces appear to belong to the same central torso, perhaps a nod to the artist’s contemplations of the multiplicity of identity and the self. Stretching and expanding into three painted planes, these figures resist the constraints of the canvas. A recurrent theme of Quarles’ oeuvre, these seemingly cramped figures reference the artist’s feeling of displacement as a queer, mixed-race artist within a larger culture of heteronormativity. The figures’ feet descend below the central plane into a Hockney-inspired passage of water. Quarles leaves this passage unfinished, making vulnerable her hand and offering the viewer an access point to complete the image with their own self-perceptions. The figures rest upon a central plane of green, their torsos floating in a cloudy sky of blue. The figures’ upper registers push up into a linear passage of horizontal lines that alternate between midnight blues and hazy sunset oranges. One might recall Claude Monet’s Impression, Sunrise (1872), in which the suggestion of light and emotion engenders a floating world of fantasy and flowing pigment. Fallback, Back/Side likewise plays with space, abstraction, and depth, creating a three-dimensional scene composed of interrelated flat planes

Push ‘Em Little Daisies, 2019

Sotheby’s New-York: 30 September 2022
Estimated: USD 500,000 – 700,000
USD 630,000

Push ‘Em Little Daisies | Contemporary Curated | 2022 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Push ‘Em Little Daisies, 2019
Acrylic on canvas
50×52 inches (127 x 132.1 cm)
Signed, titled PUSH ‘EM LITTLE DAISIES and dated 2019 (on the verso)

Another key element of Quarles’ practice which is evident in Push ‘Em Little Daisies is how her figures’ limbs are pushed right to the edge of the canvas, introducing a sense of tension in whicher figures seem ready to crawl out of the frame. This simultaneously gives her subjects agency in their ability to push the limits of the painted space while also establishing clear limits as to how far they can go. In limiting the space and agency of her subjects, Quarles is perhaps questioning the cultural limitations of identity and race as they are defined by contemporary society. In the present work in particular, this sense of confinement is even more extreme as Quarles sandwiches her subject between two horizontal planes within the top half of the composition.

A Shaddow of Whut I Once Was, 2017

Christie’s New-York: 28 September 2022
Estimated: USD 500,000 – 700,000
USD 693,000

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985) (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
A Shaddow of Whut I Once Was, 2017
Acrylic on canvas
48×60 inches (121.9 x 152.4 cm)
Signed, titled and dated (on the reverse)

Common Ground (Worlds Apart, Miles Away), 2016

Sotheby’s New-York: 18 November 2021
Estimated: USD 120,000 – 180,000
USD 685,500

Common Ground (Worlds Apart, Miles Away) | The Now Evening Auction | 2021 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Common Ground (Worlds Apart, Miles Away), 2016
Acrylic on canvas
50×40 inches (127 x 101.6 cm)
Signed Christina Quarles twice, titled and dated 2016 (on the reverse)

Christina Quarles creates works that explore human bodies as vessels for the endless nuances of identity. In her works, figures with outstretched limbs bend and twirl in saturated pigments against planes of solid color and patches of intricate pattern. Invoking the illusionistic prowess of Surrealist pioneers Salvador Dalí and Tarsila Do Amaral, Common Ground (Worlds Apart, Miles Away), an exceptional example of Quarles’ coveted oeuvre, makes the body malleable, capable of psychological introspection and communicative of an inner world. Coupling the dream-like essence of Surrealism with the raw emotion of Abstract Expressionism, this work sees two figures simultaneously connected and torn apart. Rendered in cold shades of grey and blue, the leftmost figure frames the other, which in contrast is rendered in warm hues of yellow and orange. These figures are only fractional; one exists in profile, their torso essentially nonexistent, while the other is only visible from the collarbone and above. Behind the figures we see a trapezoidal patch of sky in gradient blue, and beneath it, a field of grass in bright green.

Works on Paper

Into Tha Fold, 2024

Christie’s New-York: 17 May 2024
Estimated: USD 60,000 – 80,000
USD 88,200

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985), Into Tha Fold | Christie’s (christies.com)

CHRISTINA QUARLES (B. 1985)
Into Tha Fold, 2024
Acrylic on paper
30×22 inches (76.2 x 55.9 cm)

Untitled (Dissonant Bodies), 2010

Phillips New-York: 15 May 2024
Estimated: USD 30,000 – 40,000
USD 48,260

Christina Quarles – Modern & Contempora… Lot 412 May 2024 | Phillips

Arches, 2016

Sotheby’s New-York: 4 March 2024
Estimated: USD 10,000 – 15,000
USD 22,860

Arches | Contemporary Discoveries | 2024 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)