By 1904, Parisian art collector André Level was looking to own a piece by Pablo Picasso. However, he was far from the only collector admiring the young artist’s work. Level had to wait four years until a retired circus clown turned art dealer, Clovis Sagot, finally gave him the insider information he needed to begin collecting Picasso paintings. A still life work by Pablo Picasso from the collection of André Level highlights the Modern Works on Paper auction, presented by Christie’s. This piece represents Picasso’s work in a later form of Cubism, known as Synthetic Cubism. Whereas the earlier Analytic Cubism deconstructed objects into fragmented shapes, Synthetic Cubism “… was about flattening out the image and sweeping away the last traces of allusion to three-dimensional space.”
20th-century art collectors can also consider Joan Miró’s Characters. In 1937, amid the Spanish Civil War, Miró, Picasso, and other Spanish artists were asked to create murals for the country’s pavilion it the Exposition Universelle. Miró’s entry has been lost to time. However, the Characters piece available in this auction is a series of studies done in preparation for that mural. Writer Jacque Dupin describes the distorted figures of Characters as “relate[d] directly to the painter’s anguish, his secret trauma, his unexpressed outrage.” A similar theme was also explored in Picasso’s entry into the mural initiative, Guernica, which is currently exhibited in the Museo Reina Sofía in Madrid.
Outside of Europe, bidders will find a drawing by Colombian artist Fernando Botero, titled Little Girl with a Cat. Botero’s work focuses on voluminous figures, or, as Christie’s puts it, “[figures] in spaces that seem too small to contain them.” In this drawing, Botero’s interest in size can be seen not only with the little girl but also with the cat, which has several rolls of fat rippling from its chin. Those interested in this or any other piece can register to bid on Christie’s website.
Lot Categories:
Fine Art (133)# of Lots:
133Price Range:
$675 - $562,500.Interesting lots include:
Item Image | Item Name | Estimate |
---|---|---|
Joan Miró (1893-1983) Characters | Estimate: | |
Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) Still Life | Estimate: | |
Odilon Redon (1840-1916) The Crying Spider or The Despair of the Monster | Estimate: | |
Amedeo Modigliani (1884-1920) Portrait of young girl | Estimate: | |
Joan Miró (1893-1983) Portrait of Mother Ubu II | Estimate: | |
Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) Costume of the French manager in the ballet Parade | Estimate: | |
Max Ernst (1891-1976) Ohne titel | Estimate: | |
Fernando Botero Little girl with cat | Estimate: |
Contact Info
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