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Last updated: 1/25/2017
Home / Gallery Tour 1 / Masters of Modernity / Gallery Tour 2 / Artists

Masters of Modernity: Music and Dance: Larionov / Picasso / Matisse / Miró / Chagall / Leger

For selections from the show, see: The Figure / Artist and Model / Nature / Nature2 / People / People2 / People3
Music and Dance / Biblical etchings / Chagall's Lithographs for the Bible / Chagall and Paris / Kandinsky
Mikhail Larionov and his lifelong companion Nataliya Goncharova were among the leading members of the pre-Revolutionary Russian avant-garde. As Mary Chamont has noted, "The decade before the Russian Revolution was one of intense activity in the Moscow art world. Larionov and Goncharova were among the prime movers of this outburst, when young artists were full of new ideas. They met, organized exhibitions of their work, usually financed by some rich merchant, then fell apart with violent quarrels, only to form new combinations with different objectives and other patrons" (Goncharova: Stage Designs and Paintings, 8). Moving from an art that blended Russian folk-motifs with Fauvist colors, Larionov and Goncharova, who eventually married in 1955, were involved in the Knave of Diamonds Group, The Donkey's Tail exhibition of 1912, and the Target exhibition of 1913 at which they proclaimed Rayonism, one of the earliest Russian abstract movements. In 1914, Larionov and Goncharova went to Paris with Diaghilev's Ballet Russes. This pochoir is one of the products of their aspiration to a new and more modern art. Although this piece is not on the wall, it is available in the gallery for enjoyment and/or purchase. For Miro, the universe danced for its own pleasure and ours; for Chagall, dancing and music were acts that people could choose to embrace or be left out. For Léger music was a mechanism for exploring the nature of reality.
Mikhail Larionov (Russian, 1881-1964), The Peacock Mechanical Costume (Parton, pl. 19). Original color pochoir, 1919. Edition: published in Art Decoatif Thèâtral Moderne, 1919 (15 deluxe portfolios, a deluxe edition of 100 contining 8 pochoirs and an edition of 400 contining 6 pochoirs. Our impression is from one of these 3 editions). With the stamped signature lower right. Horizontal fold in center, some yellowing at crease; colors fresh. Image size: 408x240mm. Price: $2250.
Pablo Picasso (Spanish, 1881-1973), Femme assise. Color pochoir after a painting, 1930. 1250 unsigned impressions for Eugenio d'Ors's Picasso, published in Paris in 1930. Executed with Picasso's consent and under his supervision for this early study of Picasso. The first 50 copies contained an original signed and numbered Picasso lithograph executed for this book. Image size: 252x187mm. Price: $2,275.
Pablo Picasso (Spanish, 1881-1973), Les Musiciens. Color pochoir after a painting, 1930. 1250 unsigned impressions for Eugenio d'Ors's Picasso, published in Paris in 1930. Executed with Picasso's consent and under his supervision. The first 50 copies contained an original signed and numbered Picasso lithograph exectued for this book. Image size: 252x187mm. Price: $2275.
The Dancers (M. 281). Original color lithograph, 1956. 3000 unsigned impressions for Picasso Lithographe III. This lithograph served as the frontispiece to the book. It is one of a long series of lithographs and etchings Picasso has made on this theme, which was particularly important to him from 1963-65. Image size: 320x235mm. Price: $2850.
Henri Matisse (French, 1869-1954), La Danse (Duthuit books 67). Original color lithograph, 1938. Edition unknown (c. 1200 as published in Verve, in 1938). This work was produced by Matisse for Verve and printed under his supervision. There are two original linoleum cuts printed on the reverse. Matisse had painted two versions of his famous painting of the same title, one in the Barnes Collection, the other in the Hermitage Museum. This is his celebration of the Dance for a larger audience. With the usual centerfold. Image size: 356x521mm. Price: $1950.
Henri Matisse (French, 1869-1954), Danseuse Creole. Color lithograph after a paper cut-out and gouache, 1950. Published in the deluxe art review, Verve. This work was produced under Matissee's supervision for a special issue of Verve dedicated to Matisse's paper cut-outs. He died before the work was published and the volume then became a tribute to Matisse, Les Dernieres Oeuvres de Matisse. Signed & dated Juin (June) 1950 in the stone. Image size: 250x160mm. Price: $775.
Henri Matisse (French, 1869-1954), Danseuse BLeue. Color lithograph after a paper cut-out and gouache, 1952. Published in the deluxe art review, Verve. This work was published in a special issue of Verve dedicated to Matisse's paper cut-outs. He died before the work was published and the volume then became a tribute to Matisse, Les Dernieres Oeuvres de Matisse. Produced under Matisse's supervision, signed & dated 1952 in the stone. Image size: 355x260mm. Price: $875.
Joan Miro (Spain, 1893-1983), La danse de feu / The Fire's Dance (Maeght 341). Original color lithograph, 1963. 90 signed & numbered impressions of which this is one plus c. 1500 unsigned impressions with centerfolds published in the deluxe art review, Derrière le Miroir, in a celebration of Miro's collaborations with the ceramicist Jospe Llorens Artigas. The title probably refers to the action of the fire on the clay in Artigas' Japanese wood-fired kiln where they worked. There is a full-page illustration of this piece in Indelible Miro. Image size: 475x655mm. Price: $17,500.

Also available in the unsigned edition published in Derrière le Miroir with the centerfold and without margins. Image size: 380x560mm. Price: $1400.
Marc Chagall (Russia 1887-1985 Paris), The Concert (M. 176) Original color lithograph, 1957. 90 signed & numbered impressions plus 2500 unsigned impressions with centerfold as published in the deluxe art review, Derrière le Miroir. Illustrated in the 1988 Moscow Chagall Exhibition. Ours is a signed impression from the edition published in Derrière le Miroir. In The Concert, we see a scene that is like a variant on medieval or Renaissance depictions of heaven with the hosts of angels singing for the Virgin and her Son, but here it is a pair of lovers reclining in a small boat floaating down a river with the Eiffel Tower visible on the right and a mermaid swimming on the lower right while what may be a sea serpent peaceably coils about on the lower left. The choir includes a figure playing a harp as boatman, a cock top left, a ram to the right of him (in the orange area), and a bird in the yellow circle above the lovers and the harper, suggesting a dream of the total harmony of all thiings good and enjoyable. Image size: 380x560mm. Price: SOLD.

Available unsigned from the edition published in Derrière le Miroir. Price: $2,750.
Marc Chagall (Russia 1887-1985 Paris), Daphnis et Chloe (M. 222). Original color lithograph, 1960. 3000 unsigned impressions for XXe Siecle n. 14. Chagall's lithographs illustrating the story of Daphnis and Chloe are among his most famous and most desired lithographs. This work was published in advance of the 1960 portfolio as a kind of teaser. Rich intense colors help this piece to make its presence known. Image size: 315x258mm. Price: $1875.
Marc Chagall (Russia 1887-1985 Paris), Le Ballet: Daphnis et Chloe (M. 581). Original color lithograph, 1969. 10,000 unsigned impressions for Marc Chagall : Le Ballet. One of Chagall's more joyful explorations of the theme of Daphnis and Chloe, the innocent young lovers whose adventures Chagall repeatedly rehearses. Image size: 325x258mm. Price: $1,275.
Fernand Léger (French, 1881-1955), L'Accordéon / The Accordian. Hand-painted pochoir after a gouache, c. 1926. This is one of 800 unsigned impressions for an important 1928 study of Léger by E. Teriade, who would soon become the editor and publisher of the most important Surrealist journal, Minotaur, and then Verve, one of the most beautiful art reviews ever published (Paris, 1928). The work appears to be related to a painting of the same title (see Lanchner, pl. 211 and Pompidou, p. 150). Image size: 208x133mm. Price: $850.
The three sisters on a red background (Sapphire E-11). Serigraph after a gouache, 1954. 200 signed and numbered impressions, of which ours is n. 167/200. There are also 1000 impressions signed and dated in the stone. Staining in margins; some cracking at top of image. This work is part of an album of 10 serigraphs after gouaches published by Jean Bruller in Paris and distributed in 1954-55 by La Guilde internationale de la Gravure (Geneva-Paris). One of Leger's most important late works in less than perfect condition. Image size: 453x338mm. Price: $3750.

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