London stages in February modern art, impressionism and surrealism, about 60 auctioned works of great value. The first lots, and exactly 40, are all dedicated to impressionism and modern art: "Impressionist and Modern Art Evening Sale", followed in the evening session by another 20 included in the "Surrealist Art" catalogue.
The work is certainly driving the sale of the first catalogue Femme assise près d'une fenêtre a breathtaking portrait of his muse Marie-Therese Walter painted by Pablo Picasso in 1932.
FEMME ASSISE PRÈS D'UNE FENÊTRE it is to be considered an extraordinary work created by Picasso (1881-1973) in 1932 oil on canvas 146x114cm. An almost monumental work that re-proposes the golden muse: Marie-Thérèse Walter and is among the most representative images of his work. A sensual painting that contains emblems of love, sex and desire like several works by this great master of the twentieth century. The present work depicts his sitter seated in front of a window, and is one of a series of paintings from this period. Her muse appears as a powerful mix of physical attraction and sexual naivety that intoxicate the composition in that unleashed passion of Picasso.
Patrick McCaughey wrote: 'Marie-Thérèse embodies for Picasso an ideal type where love, model and goddess becomes unicum. With Marie-Thérèse, Picasso discovers a new breadth of form, less solemn than the monumental neo-classical nudes of the 1920s and with a promise of abundance and pleasure. She was also the model for a long line of large sculpted heads, which progressively became more like Sibyl – the image of eternal femininity. Perhaps most impressive of all Marie-Thérèse is the Solemn and Luminous Woman Seated by the Window from 1932 (exactly this work), where all three roles of love, model and goddess are spelled out. The sensuality of the figure, even when fully clothed, is maintained in the voluptuous, puffy outline of the body and drapery which contrasts with the chair, room and window. For all her monumentality and grandeur, Marie-Thérèse here assumes the role of companion, the female figure seen without the distractions of anguish or sexuality. The painting achieves a classical calm and a pleasant repose, a temporary refuge in a turbulent decade for Picasso' (P. McCaughey to Picasso (exhibition catalog), op. cit., 1984, p. 211).
Picasso first saw Marie-Thérèse on the streets of Paris in 1927, when he was only seventeen, while he was in an unhappy marriage to Olga Khokhlova. So she says: I was an innocent girl…”I knew nothing – either about life or about Picasso… I had gone shopping at the Galeries Lafayette and Picasso saw me leaving the subway. He took me by the arm and said: 'I am Picasso! You and I are going to do great things together' (quoted in Picasso and Weeping Women (exhibition catalog), Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1994, p. 143) . The couple's relationship was kept secret for many years, both because of Picasso's marriage to Olga and because Marie-Thérèse was too young. But the secrecy of the affair intensified Picasso's obsession with the girl, and many of her paintings, with their dramatic contrasts of light and dark, allude to their passionate secret interludes.
The first major series of paintings depicting Marie-Thérèse was executed in January 1932 in anticipation of the major retrospective that Picasso was planning for June of that year. It was during these months that he began to show his interest in this mistress of his. Up to this point he had only referred to his extramarital affair with Marie-Thérèse in total secrecy. But at the end of 1931, Picasso no longer able to repress the creative impulse that his mistress inspired, especially as her marriage was increasingly unbearable, so he began to exalt even more these voluptuous forms.
It was on the occasion of the great anthological exhibition held at the Georges petit galleries in June-July 1932 at the Kunsthaus in Zurich that his wife Olga, after noticing several paintings by Picasso with references to a specific type of woman that was clearly not hers, she began to become alert to the presence of another woman in her husband's life. Until this exhibition, Picasso's relationship with Marie-Thérèse had been a secret relationship, but it became almost impossible after this date, having come into the public domain and characteristics of this woman Marie-Thérèse whom Picasso puts center stage, where he would could preside as a radiant deity, in new roles she changed from Madonna to sphinx, from odalisque to mother earth. Sometimes he seems to humbly worship at his sanctuary, acquiring a fixed, provocative gaze of almost supernatural power, but more often, he becomes an ecstatic voyeur, catching his beloved in silence, reading, meditating, catnapping, or indulging in the most deep abandonment of sleep' (R. Rosenblum in Picasso and Portraiture: Representation and Transformation (exhibition catalogue), Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1996, p 342).
It can be concluded that this muse and lover greatly influenced Picasso's artistic creativity, making his painting even stronger and full of emotions, the same ones that his intimate lived in a total, passionate way and sublimating his intimate making each of his works dispute between the monumental aspect and something more intrinsic.
The relationship between the artist and the model is at the heart of another important work by Egon Schiele: Liebespaar (Selbstdarstellung mit Wally) . An exquisite gouache from the Leopold Museum in Vienna together with two other outstanding works on paper by the artist. Next to these iconic images of modern art we find one of the most famous subjects of Impressionism – the water lilies at Giverny – represented here by the Nymphéas.
One of the highlights of the sale concerns Joan Miró rêvant with the work Femme de l'evasion from 1945, from the collection of Miriam and Ira D. Wallach accompanied by two other works by Miró. If, on the other hand, we want to consider Impressionism in its most classical sense, we must give emphasis to a particular group composed of paintings by Monet, Sisley, Gauguin and Pissarro offered by the collection of the Earl of Jersey. Two pastels by Edgar Degas are also important
The Evening Sale is dedicated to Surrealist art and will feature notable works by many of the key figures in the Surrealist movement. Among them, a magnificent gouache by Joan Miró, son of Le Fermier épouse et executed in 1936.
One of the highlights of this sale will be the outstanding portrait of Mrs. Harrison Williams Mona Bismarck by Salvador Dali. An image of a figure amid a myriad of mythological motifs creating a dazzling composition.
But the most awaited moment concerns the surrealism of Max Ernstwith sculpture Young man with a beating heart and the opera À l'intérieur de la vue: L'oeuf, which was painted in 1929.
Super expected Top Lots for Modern Art and Impressionism:
PABLO PICASSO - FEMME ASSISE PRÈS D'UNE FENÊTRE - Estimate: 30,985,015-43,379,021 EUR
CLAUDE MONET - NYMPHÉAS AVEC REFLECTS DE HAUTES HERBES - Estimate: 14,872,807-22,309,211 EUR
JOAN MIRO - FEMME RÊVANT DE L'ÉVASION - Estimate: 9,915,205-14,872,807 EUR
EGON SCHIELE - LIEBESPAAR (SELBSTDARSTELLUNG MIT WALLY) Estimate: 8,056,104-10,534,905 EUR
CLAUDE MONET – LE GIVRE À GIVERNY – Estimate: 4,957,602-7,436,403 EUR
EDGAR DEGAS - DANSEUSE RAJUSTANT SON CHAUSSON - Estimate: 3,718,201-6,197,003 EUR
EDGAR DEGAS - APRÈS LE BAIN (FEMME S'ESSUYANT) - Estimate: 3,098,501-4,337,902 EUR
EGON SCHIELE - SELBSTDARSTELLUNG IN GRÜNEM HEMD MIT GESCHLOSSENEN AUGEN - Estimate: 2,230,921-3,098,501 EUR
ALFRED SISLEY - LA SEINE PRÈS DE BOUGIVAL – MATIN D'HIVER - Estimate: 1,487,280-2,230,921 EUR
Toplots for Surrealism:
JOAN MIRO - LE FERMIER ET SON ÉPOUSE -Estimate: 6,816,703-9,295,504 EUR
RENÉ MAGRITTE - LES BELLES RELATIONS - Estimate: 2,478,801-3,718,201 EUR
MAX ERNST - SURREALISM - Estimate: 1,859,100-2,478,801 EUR
SALVADOR DALI - PORTRAIT OF MRS HARRISON WILLIAMS - Estimate: 1,859,100-2,478,801 EUR
PAUL DELVAUX - LES COURTISANES OR LE JARDIN DES COURTISANES OR LA TERRASSE - Esteem: 1,239,400-1,859,100 EUR
MAX ERNST - À L'INTÉRIEUR DE LA VUE: L'ŒUF - Estimate: 867,580-1,115,460 EUR
PAUL DELVAUX - THE ECHAFAUDAGE - Estimate: 743,640-991,520 EUR
RENÉ MAGRITTE - THE PASSION OF LIGHTS - Estimate: 619,700-867,580 EUR
MAX ERNST - JEUNE HOMME AU CŒUR BATTANT – Esteem: 495,760-743,640 EUR
ANDRE MASSON - AUBE TO MONTSERRAT - Esteem: 495,760-743,640 EUR
