Lot n° 33
Estimation :
500000 - 800000
EUR
Result with fees
Result
: 640 000EUR
Leonard Tsuguharu FOUJITA (1886-1968) - Lot 33
Leonard Tsuguharu FOUJITA (1886-1968)
Nude in the studio, 1925
Oil on canvas.
Signed and dated lower left "Tsuguharu" in Japanese and "Foujita 1925".
Signed on the back "Tsuguharu" in Japanese and "Foujita", monogrammed "F" at the top on the horizontal bar of the stretcher, titled and dated "Model 1925" on the central bar, located "à Paris" and signed "Tsuguharu" in Japanese on the right vertical bar.
126 x 60 cm
Provenance:
Edmée Lamiral Collection, Paris. By descent.
Bibliography:
Musée des Beaux-arts de Reims, La Collection Foujita - Catalogue des œuvres, Éditions Snoeck, 2018, positive print of our painting in gelatino-silver bromide on monochrome development paper of our painting, 30.4 x 24 cm, Inv.2014.3.637, reproduced p. 239; J. Roseman, Orthomatic silver gelatin-bromide negative glass plate of our painting, 29.8 x 23.8 cm, Inv. 2014.3.630, reproduced p. 237.
We thank Madame Sylvie Buisson for the information she provided.
A certificate from Madame Sylvie Buisson will be given to the buyer.
The model of the painting is Edmée Lamiral, daughter of a sculptor from Boulogne Charles Paul Lamiral. Through her father, she frequented the entire artistic milieu of the interwar period and posed for several artists. Her presence next to a nude woman on one of the plates of the album "Les Femmes" in 1930, shows that she posed for several years for the Japanese artist.
Here, the model immediately refers us to the sculpture. The halo on the left side of the body accentuates the modeling, bordering on mannerism. During his trip to Italy in 1921, Foujita discovered the Sistine Chapel and the painted work of Michelangelo. The power of the bodies represented in very expressive postures left a lasting impression on him. His style is reminiscent of grisaille, where the monochrome paint imitates a sculpted bas-relief using a degradation between black and white and cameo of gray. As the expert Sylvie Buisson points out: "His prowess is to draw directly freehand the outline of the forms with Indian ink, or black oil paint, with his extra fine Japanese brush, without repentance, directly on the white preparation of the background that he made a few days before from a mixture of powdered oyster shells, animal glue, silver white and various binders to obtain this smooth and flat surface like porcelain that allows him to achieve the shades of gray and the traces of his work.
The look of this woman destabilizes us, like La Belle ferronnière of Leonard de Vinci. A drawing of a cat that stretches in the upper left hanging by a thumbtack against the wall contrasts with the face of the model. The frame of a painting in the lower right corner has never been seen in Foujita's work. Which canvas is it? We would like to turn it over.
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