Decade 1890-1899
See also : Top 10 Painting Art on paper Holland Van Gogh France Paris Monet Monet before 1900 Gauguin Northern Europe Munch The Man Man and woman Groups Landscape Midi Bouquet Tabletop Flowers
1889-1890 Cézanne playing with Apples
2013 SOLD 42 M$ including premium
Chardin had an innovative interpretation of the still life. He wanted his painting to approach as close as possible to the truth, and brought an extreme care in the texture.
Cézanne plays with apples like an infant with cubes. Fruits are grouped within small uneven piles in which their variety of colors brings an additional appeal. Sometimes a group is interrupted by the frame as if the model was unlimited.
If we consider that the real subject is the painting itself and not the peaceful fruit, Cézanne's apples anticipate abstract art. It puzzles the viewer by its original composition, as if it tried to tell a story or to evoke a feeling, like Kandinsky and Miro later. Each individual element is however realistic like an image by Chardin.
The group of apples for sale at Sotheby's on May 7 in New York is both simple and bold. This oil on canvas 38 x 46 cm painted in 1889-1890 is estimated $ 25M. Here is the link to the catalog.
Sold for $ 60M including premium at Sotheby's on May 10, 1999, another composition, 60 x 73 cm, painted four years later is more ambitious. The folds of the white tablecloth generate a complex interplay of fruit, the pitcher is the referee and the curtain states that the still lifes of Cézanne are indeed dramas.
POST SALE COMMENT
Cezanne's still lifes are the most remarkable modernist advances of their time. This painting was sold $ 42M including premium.
I invite you to watch the video shared by Sotheby's :
Cézanne plays with apples like an infant with cubes. Fruits are grouped within small uneven piles in which their variety of colors brings an additional appeal. Sometimes a group is interrupted by the frame as if the model was unlimited.
If we consider that the real subject is the painting itself and not the peaceful fruit, Cézanne's apples anticipate abstract art. It puzzles the viewer by its original composition, as if it tried to tell a story or to evoke a feeling, like Kandinsky and Miro later. Each individual element is however realistic like an image by Chardin.
The group of apples for sale at Sotheby's on May 7 in New York is both simple and bold. This oil on canvas 38 x 46 cm painted in 1889-1890 is estimated $ 25M. Here is the link to the catalog.
Sold for $ 60M including premium at Sotheby's on May 10, 1999, another composition, 60 x 73 cm, painted four years later is more ambitious. The folds of the white tablecloth generate a complex interplay of fruit, the pitcher is the referee and the curtain states that the still lifes of Cézanne are indeed dramas.
POST SALE COMMENT
Cezanne's still lifes are the most remarkable modernist advances of their time. This painting was sold $ 42M including premium.
I invite you to watch the video shared by Sotheby's :
1890 Between Harvest and Snow
2019 SOLD for $ 110M including premium
The series of Meules painted by Monet after the 1890 harvest was not premeditated. The haystacks are installed in the fields as temporary semaphores that break the monotonous surface devoid of its plants.
Monet loves this theme that is typical of country life without the need to add humans or birds. He begins with five landscapes in which two haystacks are distant from each other.
According to the sequence established by Wildenstein, the next sub-series is composed of two oil paintings on canvas 73 x 93 cm executed during the autumn of 1890. The alignment of two haystacks leads to the tall trees on the horizon, against the light in the last rays of sunset. For the first time the rest of the image is minimized. The predominance of the expression of colors over theme and form opens the way to modern art.
The second of these pictures, W1273, goes even further by managing to avoid the shadows of the two stacks. All that remains is the light that plays with the contours of stacks and trees and reveals the shimmering colors of the field. It was dated 1891 by the artist, certainly by reference to the year of the first public exhibition of the series, in the gallery of Durand-Ruel.
W1273 will be sold by Sotheby's in New York on May 14, lot 8. The March 15 press release announces an estimate in excess of $ 55M. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
The deep nature of a landscape can no longer be expressed by a single snapshot. In this series which ends in January 1891 and totals 25 paintings, Monet has captured 25 moments of light of a wide variety : morning, evening, full sun, snow, mist. In the last pictures the color also comes to sublimate the perspective with the reduction of the theme to a single haystack. Also taken at sunset, W1290 was sold for $ 81M including premium by Christie's on November 16, 2016.
Monet loves this theme that is typical of country life without the need to add humans or birds. He begins with five landscapes in which two haystacks are distant from each other.
According to the sequence established by Wildenstein, the next sub-series is composed of two oil paintings on canvas 73 x 93 cm executed during the autumn of 1890. The alignment of two haystacks leads to the tall trees on the horizon, against the light in the last rays of sunset. For the first time the rest of the image is minimized. The predominance of the expression of colors over theme and form opens the way to modern art.
The second of these pictures, W1273, goes even further by managing to avoid the shadows of the two stacks. All that remains is the light that plays with the contours of stacks and trees and reveals the shimmering colors of the field. It was dated 1891 by the artist, certainly by reference to the year of the first public exhibition of the series, in the gallery of Durand-Ruel.
W1273 will be sold by Sotheby's in New York on May 14, lot 8. The March 15 press release announces an estimate in excess of $ 55M. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
The deep nature of a landscape can no longer be expressed by a single snapshot. In this series which ends in January 1891 and totals 25 paintings, Monet has captured 25 moments of light of a wide variety : morning, evening, full sun, snow, mist. In the last pictures the color also comes to sublimate the perspective with the reduction of the theme to a single haystack. Also taken at sunset, W1290 was sold for $ 81M including premium by Christie's on November 16, 2016.
An enduring symbol of Impressionism from Claude Monet's iconic Haystacks series will lead an important private collection of 8 Impressionist works on offer in #SothebysImpMod Evening Sale on 14 May in #NYC. Learn more: https://t.co/B4xVl8QWFA pic.twitter.com/SMDorfOowE
— Sotheby's (@Sothebys) March 15, 2019
1890 Portrait du Dr Gachet by Van Gogh
1990 SOLD 82.5 M$ before fees by Christie's
Shared by Wikimedia :
1890 Wild Flowers for Dr Gachet
2014 SOLD for $ 62M including premium
After he entered the asylum at Saint-Rémy de Provence in May 1889, the health of Vincent van Gogh did not improve. But they had to look for a solution. Auvers-sur-Oise is a pretty village frequented by artists. His visit is prepared by his brother Theo in consultation with Dr. Gachet.
In May 1890 Vincent moved into a room at the local inn in Auvers. He did not have a studio and regularly attended the home of Gachet, a friend of the Impressionists and Cézanne.
Since he is sick, Vincent is terrorized by the idea of failure and by the risk of a new crisis of dementia. With the energy of despair, he gives a new impetus to his old ambition to become the best painter of all time, the only one capable of a synthesis of all genres. Gachet has a painting by Cézanne showing a bouquet of flowers. Vincent wants to do better.
Spring brings forth the flowers into the fields. On November 4 in New York, Sotheby's sells an oil on canvas 66 x 50 cm painted by Vincent on 16 and 17 June 1890, lot 17 estimated $ 30M. Executed in the clear intention to thank Gachet for his help, this artwork shows a vase filled with daisies and poppies.
The composition is powerful and the colors are gorgeous, dominated in the center by the fiery red poppies. The groups of flowers shine like some characters within the ultimate tragedy of Vincent.
I invite you to play the video shared by Sotheby's :
In May 1890 Vincent moved into a room at the local inn in Auvers. He did not have a studio and regularly attended the home of Gachet, a friend of the Impressionists and Cézanne.
Since he is sick, Vincent is terrorized by the idea of failure and by the risk of a new crisis of dementia. With the energy of despair, he gives a new impetus to his old ambition to become the best painter of all time, the only one capable of a synthesis of all genres. Gachet has a painting by Cézanne showing a bouquet of flowers. Vincent wants to do better.
Spring brings forth the flowers into the fields. On November 4 in New York, Sotheby's sells an oil on canvas 66 x 50 cm painted by Vincent on 16 and 17 June 1890, lot 17 estimated $ 30M. Executed in the clear intention to thank Gachet for his help, this artwork shows a vase filled with daisies and poppies.
The composition is powerful and the colors are gorgeous, dominated in the center by the fiery red poppies. The groups of flowers shine like some characters within the ultimate tragedy of Vincent.
I invite you to play the video shared by Sotheby's :
1891 A Stack in Winter
2016 SOLD for $ 81M including premium
Claude Monet was not a theorist. He progressed by releasing his emotion. The Impression soleil levant painted in 1872 fades within the fog the real features of the view. This painting is a burst of intuition and is described in the history of art as the cornerstone of Impressionnisme. However it took nearly two decades for the artist to jump to a still more decisive step, with the Meules.
He had been very active throughout that period. His paintings of the Gare St Lazare in 1877 constituted a series that displayed the variations in color depending on the intensity of sunlight and on the thickness of smoke from the trains. His solitary travel in Normandy in 1882 for comforting after the death of Camille is very important : Monet demonstrates to himself that lighting is better than topography for expressing a mood.
When comes the end of summer 1890 Monet is ready for a new experience. The vegetation will disappear with winter. As for every year the grain stacks will remain alone in the middle of the fields until the wheat threshing of the spring. They will be the perfect support for Monet to perform his observations of colors through all weather conditions and at all moments of time. This series totaled 25 paintings.
Three of them have been specifically grouped as a ultimate achievement of the Meules in the catalogue raisonné prepared by Daniel Wildenstein. Only one stack is visible in front of a retracted landscape. It is truncated either from top or from one side. The color emotion is not challenged by that figurative feature reduced to nothing more than a bulky triangle. In 1896, in front of one of these paintings, Kandinsky was dazzled.
Another Meule from that group of three, oil on canvas 73 x 92 cm painted in 1891, reference Wildenstein 1290, was sold for $ 12M including premium by Sotheby's on 11 May 1999. It is now for sale by Christie's in New York on November 16, lot 9 B. The targeted price was disclosed at around $ 45M by the specialized press.
Please watch the video shared by Christie's. The image below is shared by Wikimedia.
He had been very active throughout that period. His paintings of the Gare St Lazare in 1877 constituted a series that displayed the variations in color depending on the intensity of sunlight and on the thickness of smoke from the trains. His solitary travel in Normandy in 1882 for comforting after the death of Camille is very important : Monet demonstrates to himself that lighting is better than topography for expressing a mood.
When comes the end of summer 1890 Monet is ready for a new experience. The vegetation will disappear with winter. As for every year the grain stacks will remain alone in the middle of the fields until the wheat threshing of the spring. They will be the perfect support for Monet to perform his observations of colors through all weather conditions and at all moments of time. This series totaled 25 paintings.
Three of them have been specifically grouped as a ultimate achievement of the Meules in the catalogue raisonné prepared by Daniel Wildenstein. Only one stack is visible in front of a retracted landscape. It is truncated either from top or from one side. The color emotion is not challenged by that figurative feature reduced to nothing more than a bulky triangle. In 1896, in front of one of these paintings, Kandinsky was dazzled.
Another Meule from that group of three, oil on canvas 73 x 92 cm painted in 1891, reference Wildenstein 1290, was sold for $ 12M including premium by Sotheby's on 11 May 1999. It is now for sale by Christie's in New York on November 16, lot 9 B. The targeted price was disclosed at around $ 45M by the specialized press.
Please watch the video shared by Christie's. The image below is shared by Wikimedia.
1892 Te Poipoi (le matin) by Paul Gauguin
2007 SOLD 39 M$ including premium by Sotheby's
Shared by Wikimedia :
1892 The Tropical Peace of Paul Gauguin
2017 SOLD for £ 20.3M including premium
Paul Gauguin reaches his paradise in October 1891 in Mataiea, a village in the countryside 45 km away from Papeete. He takes care not to disturb the tranquility of the place. The inhabitants who are maintaining their ancestral customs welcome this foreigner. Without a competitor, without a false friend, without the need to prove his genius to his neighbors who now ignore his craft, Gauguin gets imbued with the exotic atmosphere and colors.
In 1892 in Mataiea, he meets his dream of developing a new art based on a subtle blend between the observation of landscapes and people and an exaggerated imagination of colors that will soon influence Matisse. His ideal landscape is not a topographical reality. His characters and horses are fixed for eternity in a static occupation.
Te Hare (la maison), oil on canvas 73 x 92 cm, is one of these peaceful scenes. This house is the hut that the painter rents in the village. Or not : it does not matter. It is dominated by a tall hibiscus tree. The extreme colors of tree and hills express the tropical moisture.
The rejection of Europe by Gauguin is extremely violent but not final. He returns to France with the intention of showing how his art has evolved. The exhibition of his Tahitian masterpieces by Durand-Ruel in 1894 horrifies Monet, Renoir and Pissarro. In the sale organized in 1895 at Drouot to finance the last exile of Gauguin, Te Hare is acquired by Daniel Halévy, encouraged by the last master who still understood and encouraged the artist, Edgar Degas.
Te Hare was sold in November 7, 1991 by Ader Picard Tajan for FF 52M, a very high price for that time. This painting is estimated £ 12M for sale by Christie's in London on February 28, lot 18. Painted in the same year, Le Vallon, 42 x 67 cm, was sold for £ 6.4M including premium by Christie's on June 21, 2011.
Please watch the video shared by Christie's :
In 1892 in Mataiea, he meets his dream of developing a new art based on a subtle blend between the observation of landscapes and people and an exaggerated imagination of colors that will soon influence Matisse. His ideal landscape is not a topographical reality. His characters and horses are fixed for eternity in a static occupation.
Te Hare (la maison), oil on canvas 73 x 92 cm, is one of these peaceful scenes. This house is the hut that the painter rents in the village. Or not : it does not matter. It is dominated by a tall hibiscus tree. The extreme colors of tree and hills express the tropical moisture.
The rejection of Europe by Gauguin is extremely violent but not final. He returns to France with the intention of showing how his art has evolved. The exhibition of his Tahitian masterpieces by Durand-Ruel in 1894 horrifies Monet, Renoir and Pissarro. In the sale organized in 1895 at Drouot to finance the last exile of Gauguin, Te Hare is acquired by Daniel Halévy, encouraged by the last master who still understood and encouraged the artist, Edgar Degas.
Te Hare was sold in November 7, 1991 by Ader Picard Tajan for FF 52M, a very high price for that time. This painting is estimated £ 12M for sale by Christie's in London on February 28, lot 18. Painted in the same year, Le Vallon, 42 x 67 cm, was sold for £ 6.4M including premium by Christie's on June 21, 2011.
Please watch the video shared by Christie's :
Christie’s Announces £12m Gauguin, Matisse for March in London https://t.co/C91maVwpfp pic.twitter.com/z1lTJOJtU4
— Art Market Monitor (@artmarket) February 7, 2017
1892 Charms of a Shiny Sun
2019 SOLD for £ 19.5M including premium
Pointillism is the painstaking process by which Seurat and Signac apply their Divisionniste theories : intertwined colors generate an optical illusion of homogeneity which is more vibrant than a flat surface. Signac is experimenting with the brightest colors and tries to convince Seurat. Van Rysselberghe will however be the only one to follow him in that way.
In 1891 Seurat suddenly dies at 31 years old. Signac, very shocked, tries unsuccessfully to promote the art of his friend. In the same year Cross settles in Le Lavandou for therapeutic reasons. He advises Signac to come back to vigor under the sun of the South.
A great lover of yachting, Paul Signac leaves Brittany in the following year and sails to the Mediterranean Sea through the Canal du Midi. He is dazzled by Saint-Tropez, a small fishing village that is at that time only accessible by boat. He settles therein permanently. The beauty of this place isolated from the rest of the world satisfies his quest for an anarchist paradise on earth.
Signac immediately applies his artistic theories to the shiny sun of Saint-Tropez. On February 27 in London, Christie's sells as lot 26 an oil on canvas 65 x 81 cm painted in 1892, identified in his ledger as Opus 236 with the title "Le Port au soleil couchant". The splendid colors are enhanced in naive style outlines in the taste of Seurat.
The next Opus, 237, is titled Maisons du Port, Saint-Tropez. Signac applies here a less poetic drawing where the too visible dots come to blur the desire for a topographic realism. This smaller oil on canvas 47 x 55 cm was sold for $ 10.7M including premium by Sotheby's on May 9, 2016.
In 1891 Seurat suddenly dies at 31 years old. Signac, very shocked, tries unsuccessfully to promote the art of his friend. In the same year Cross settles in Le Lavandou for therapeutic reasons. He advises Signac to come back to vigor under the sun of the South.
A great lover of yachting, Paul Signac leaves Brittany in the following year and sails to the Mediterranean Sea through the Canal du Midi. He is dazzled by Saint-Tropez, a small fishing village that is at that time only accessible by boat. He settles therein permanently. The beauty of this place isolated from the rest of the world satisfies his quest for an anarchist paradise on earth.
Signac immediately applies his artistic theories to the shiny sun of Saint-Tropez. On February 27 in London, Christie's sells as lot 26 an oil on canvas 65 x 81 cm painted in 1892, identified in his ledger as Opus 236 with the title "Le Port au soleil couchant". The splendid colors are enhanced in naive style outlines in the taste of Seurat.
The next Opus, 237, is titled Maisons du Port, Saint-Tropez. Signac applies here a less poetic drawing where the too visible dots come to blur the desire for a topographic realism. This smaller oil on canvas 47 x 55 cm was sold for $ 10.7M including premium by Sotheby's on May 9, 2016.
Christie’s Says Signac Record Should Fall in February https://t.co/kiK5SLH1qb pic.twitter.com/Nn3ZvtUoCf
— Art Market Monitor (@artmarket) October 26, 2018
1893 The Slow Drift of the Ice Blocks
2017 SOLD for $ 23.4M including premium
After the views of the Meules throughout the winter 1890-1891, the Peupliers painted in 1891 mark a turning point in the creativity of Claude Monet now attentive to express the tiny variations of light in a single composition.
In January 1893 Monet is working outdoors at Bennecourt, not far away from Giverny, and watches the ice blocks drifting on the Seine river. He prepares his series carefully until the thaw before finishing the paintings in his studio according to his usual practice. Very similar at first sight, these artworks display significant variations of the atmosphere.
The view numbered 1337 by Wildenstein is titled Glaçons, Effet blanc. The artist shares the chilly mist of that winter which he likes so much. This oil on canvas 65 x 100 cm was sold for $ 16M including premium by Sotheby's on November 6, 2013 over a lower estimate of $ 9M.
On November 14 in New York, Sotheby's sells the Wildenstein 1336, lot 25 estimated $ 18M. In the same size as the 1337, it is colored by an attenuated sunlight. The thaw is less advanced and the ice blocks closer to the observer define the water plane above the reflections of the tall trees.
The art of Claude Monet is a continuous progress. 1336 anticipates the magics of the Nymphéas plane marking the surface of the pond that will occupy him from 1905 to 1919.
Please watch the video in which Sotheby's also shows another landscape coming at the same auction sale.
In January 1893 Monet is working outdoors at Bennecourt, not far away from Giverny, and watches the ice blocks drifting on the Seine river. He prepares his series carefully until the thaw before finishing the paintings in his studio according to his usual practice. Very similar at first sight, these artworks display significant variations of the atmosphere.
The view numbered 1337 by Wildenstein is titled Glaçons, Effet blanc. The artist shares the chilly mist of that winter which he likes so much. This oil on canvas 65 x 100 cm was sold for $ 16M including premium by Sotheby's on November 6, 2013 over a lower estimate of $ 9M.
On November 14 in New York, Sotheby's sells the Wildenstein 1336, lot 25 estimated $ 18M. In the same size as the 1337, it is colored by an attenuated sunlight. The thaw is less advanced and the ice blocks closer to the observer define the water plane above the reflections of the tall trees.
The art of Claude Monet is a continuous progress. 1336 anticipates the magics of the Nymphéas plane marking the surface of the pond that will occupy him from 1905 to 1919.
Please watch the video in which Sotheby's also shows another landscape coming at the same auction sale.
Ahead of the public exhibition opening on 3 Nov in #NYC, browse #SothebysImpMod Art Evening Sale here: https://t.co/dZ70DI1MlS pic.twitter.com/bz2i0N7obb
— Sotheby's (@Sothebys) October 29, 2017
1894 The most beautiful of Vampyrs (was made by Munch)
2008 SOLD 38 M$ including premium
This will be one of the stakes (!) of the season: Sotheby's sells a Vampire of Edvard Munch on November 3 in New York.
Chance of the sales or rediscovery of Munch? A week ago, I devoted an article in the Prints group to a lithographic copy of the "Scream". The next day I announced in my weekly preview the arrival of a Vampire, at Sotheby's in London on October 2! (300 K£, lot 81). But now it's even better: I do not speak of an engraving, but of an oil on canvas.
Munch was a very important artist, who knew perfectly how to mingle love and death. His extraordinary lithograph "Madonna" has also been a few months ago the subject of an article on these networks. He was an illustrator concerned about the disclosure of his work, who made his oils on canvas in a small number of examples and added lithographic issues with a virtually identical drawing. As a result, this female "vampire", with her flame-color long hair, kissing on the neck of her lover, is an image that the auction news bring us often.
The Vampire was painted in four copies in 1893-1894, and the example to be sold is the only one in private hands. It is well known in New York, where it had been loaned during ten years to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Sotheby's expects more than $ 35 million.
On 7 May 2008, a painting with peaceful subject, Girls on a bridge, was sold in the same auction room at $ 30.8 million including expenses.
POST SALE COMMENT
In the chronology of the sales, the first is the print : 325 K£ including fees.
It is always nice to see an important work acknowledged by the verdict of the market. This is the case for this remarkable Vampire, sold $ 38 million charge included.
The image is shared by Wikimedia :
Chance of the sales or rediscovery of Munch? A week ago, I devoted an article in the Prints group to a lithographic copy of the "Scream". The next day I announced in my weekly preview the arrival of a Vampire, at Sotheby's in London on October 2! (300 K£, lot 81). But now it's even better: I do not speak of an engraving, but of an oil on canvas.
Munch was a very important artist, who knew perfectly how to mingle love and death. His extraordinary lithograph "Madonna" has also been a few months ago the subject of an article on these networks. He was an illustrator concerned about the disclosure of his work, who made his oils on canvas in a small number of examples and added lithographic issues with a virtually identical drawing. As a result, this female "vampire", with her flame-color long hair, kissing on the neck of her lover, is an image that the auction news bring us often.
The Vampire was painted in four copies in 1893-1894, and the example to be sold is the only one in private hands. It is well known in New York, where it had been loaned during ten years to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Sotheby's expects more than $ 35 million.
On 7 May 2008, a painting with peaceful subject, Girls on a bridge, was sold in the same auction room at $ 30.8 million including expenses.
POST SALE COMMENT
In the chronology of the sales, the first is the print : 325 K£ including fees.
It is always nice to see an important work acknowledged by the verdict of the market. This is the case for this remarkable Vampire, sold $ 38 million charge included.
The image is shared by Wikimedia :
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1895 The Scream of Nature
2012 SOLD 120 M$ including premium
The Scream by Edvard Munch has every reason to be the most famous image of modern art.
The artist, exalted by the meaning of life, is constantly navigating the limits of a morbid insanity. In 1889, during the Exposition Universelle in Paris, he is fascinated by the intensity of emotions expressed by Van Gogh, Gauguin and Toulouse-Lautrec.
In early 1892, Munch lives his own road to Damascus. He sees the sky ablaze at sunset, like an indomitable force of nature which has invaded the fjord in a terrible explosion of colors. He writes in his notebook a short poem stating that the happening had generated an intense fatigue to him.
No doubt he will be mesmerized by this vision for over a year, before daring to translate the memory of his anxiety as a painting and a pastel with a title evocating his inspiration: the Scream of Nature.
It took him another two years to exorcise his anxiety. In 1895, he made a second pastel, 79 x 59 cm, to be sold by Sotheby's in New York on May 2. Now conscious of having created a masterpiece, he prepares on the same year the first lithography. The fourth and last version of Munch's Scream is much later.
The pastel of 1895 is exceptional, and Sotheby's expects $ 80M. This is the only version where the artist has included the poem, hand painted into the frame. The two friends are still there in the distance, but are not any more interested in the scene, leaving the main character lonely struggling with his own dehumanization.
This is the only one of the four artworks to be still in private hands, and it had been little seen outside Norway. It is illustrated on Sotheby's page announcing the sale.
I invite you to watch the video shared by Sotheby's International Realty.
POST SALE COMMENT
Ite missa est. In a few words, everything is told: world record for a work of art, $ 120M including premium.
Rarely a record has been so deserved: last original in private hands, this pastel also marks the top of the emotional maturity of the artist on this theme, with dazzling colors.
The image is shared by Wikimedia.
The artist, exalted by the meaning of life, is constantly navigating the limits of a morbid insanity. In 1889, during the Exposition Universelle in Paris, he is fascinated by the intensity of emotions expressed by Van Gogh, Gauguin and Toulouse-Lautrec.
In early 1892, Munch lives his own road to Damascus. He sees the sky ablaze at sunset, like an indomitable force of nature which has invaded the fjord in a terrible explosion of colors. He writes in his notebook a short poem stating that the happening had generated an intense fatigue to him.
No doubt he will be mesmerized by this vision for over a year, before daring to translate the memory of his anxiety as a painting and a pastel with a title evocating his inspiration: the Scream of Nature.
It took him another two years to exorcise his anxiety. In 1895, he made a second pastel, 79 x 59 cm, to be sold by Sotheby's in New York on May 2. Now conscious of having created a masterpiece, he prepares on the same year the first lithography. The fourth and last version of Munch's Scream is much later.
The pastel of 1895 is exceptional, and Sotheby's expects $ 80M. This is the only version where the artist has included the poem, hand painted into the frame. The two friends are still there in the distance, but are not any more interested in the scene, leaving the main character lonely struggling with his own dehumanization.
This is the only one of the four artworks to be still in private hands, and it had been little seen outside Norway. It is illustrated on Sotheby's page announcing the sale.
I invite you to watch the video shared by Sotheby's International Realty.
POST SALE COMMENT
Ite missa est. In a few words, everything is told: world record for a work of art, $ 120M including premium.
Rarely a record has been so deserved: last original in private hands, this pastel also marks the top of the emotional maturity of the artist on this theme, with dazzling colors.
The image is shared by Wikimedia.
1897 Pissarro in Paris
2014 SOLD 19.7 M£ including premium
Linked with the greatest French painters of his time, Camille Pissarro had however a deeply independent temperament. Close to the anarchists, he looked for an original way that is not the realism of Corot or the pointillism of Seurat, two styles that he once seriously tried.
Considered now as one of the founders of Impressionism, he rather was one of its last precursors. Living in Pontoise and later in Eragny, he painted local themes : the village, the river, the orchards, the peasants. Close to nature, he observes the beautiful colors that vary according to season, time and sky. The Impressionist technique of restoring the shades without using lines matches perfectly his artistic quest.
Many years later, Pissarro is now feeling to be the last guarantor of the impressionist purity against the younger generation of Signac and Bonnard. After a discussion with Durand-Ruel, he begins a series of views of Paris.
In 1897, he rents a room for several months at the Grand Hôtel de Russie to observe the unlimited perspective and the busy life of Boulevard Montmartre. He knows to capture the mood of a moment.
His spring morning with the gas nozzle still lit, the shy sun onto the wet street and the early leaves that do not hide the branches is one of the best views of the series. This oil on canvas 65 x 81 cm is estimated £ 7M for sale by Sotheby's in London on February 5, lot 43 in the catalog.
POST SALE COMMENT
This beautiful demonstration of impressionist art was sold for £ 19.7 million including premium.
I invite you to play the video shared by Sotheby's :
Considered now as one of the founders of Impressionism, he rather was one of its last precursors. Living in Pontoise and later in Eragny, he painted local themes : the village, the river, the orchards, the peasants. Close to nature, he observes the beautiful colors that vary according to season, time and sky. The Impressionist technique of restoring the shades without using lines matches perfectly his artistic quest.
Many years later, Pissarro is now feeling to be the last guarantor of the impressionist purity against the younger generation of Signac and Bonnard. After a discussion with Durand-Ruel, he begins a series of views of Paris.
In 1897, he rents a room for several months at the Grand Hôtel de Russie to observe the unlimited perspective and the busy life of Boulevard Montmartre. He knows to capture the mood of a moment.
His spring morning with the gas nozzle still lit, the shy sun onto the wet street and the early leaves that do not hide the branches is one of the best views of the series. This oil on canvas 65 x 81 cm is estimated £ 7M for sale by Sotheby's in London on February 5, lot 43 in the catalog.
POST SALE COMMENT
This beautiful demonstration of impressionist art was sold for £ 19.7 million including premium.
I invite you to play the video shared by Sotheby's :
