David Bates (American, b. 1952) Sunflowers, 2003 Oil on canvas 48 x 36 inches (121.9 x 91.4 cm) Signed lower right: Bates Signed, titled, dated, and inscribed on stretcher: David Bates / Sunflowers / 48x36 2003 / Oil on Canvas PROVENANCE: DC Moore Gallery, New York; Private collection. EXHIBITED: DC Moore Gallery, New York, David Bates, February 12-March 13, 2004. Throughout his career, David Bates has returned repeatedly to flowers and still life, transforming one of painting’s most traditional subjects into something unmistakably his own. Like the fishermen, birds, and landscapes that populate his work, Bates’s flowers are drawn from a deep connection to nature and personal experience; his still life also carries memories of his mother, giving these seemingly simple subjects an intimate dimension. In Sunflowers of 2003, Bates approaches the familiar flower with the muscular brushwork, bold outlines, and strong sense of form that characterize his mature style. These are not delicate flowers. They have weight, personality, and an almost physical presence, filling the canvas with the same energy Bates brings to his figures and Gulf Coast landscapes. His still life reveals his deep understanding of modernist traditions—particularly artists such as Matisse and Picasso—while remaining rooted in his own distinctly American and Southern experience. Bates’s flowers also demonstrate the close relationship between his painting and sculpture. Their simplified, strongly constructed forms seem almost carved or modeled rather than merely painted, an interchange between two and three dimensions that became increasingly important throughout his career. Exhibited at DC Moore Gallery in New York in 2004, Sunflowers is a particularly compelling example of how Bates revitalized the traditional still life, making an ordinary and familiar subject feel powerful, immediate, and entirely contemporary. HID12401132022 © 2026 Heritage Auctions | All Rights Reserved www.HA.com/TexasAuctioneerLicenseNotice

DC Moore Gallery, New York, David Bates, February 12-March 13, 2004.

DC Moore Gallery, New York; Private collection.

Unlined. Under UV examination, no apparent inpainting.
Framed Dimensions 50.625 X 38.625 Inches