Mikhail Larionov

Michel (Mikhaïl Feodorovitch) Larionov Tiraspol/Moldawien 1881 – 1964 Fontenay-aux-Roses „KOMPOSITION“ (before) 1923. Colour lithograph on Japan paper, in the original mat. 44 x 30 cm (50,3 x 34,5 cm) (17 ⅜ x 11 ¾ in. (19 ¾ x 13 ⅝ in.)) Signed. Söhn HDO 104-9. - From the edition of 10 prints on this paper from a total edition of 110 copies. Bauhaus-Drucke Neue Europäische Graphik, fourth portfolio (with the blindstamp Lugt 2558 b). Müller & Co. Verlag, Potsdam 1923.

Mikhail Fedorovich Larionov (Russian/French, 1881-1964) Composition Composition signed with initials in Latin (lower left and right), reverse signed in Latin and inscribed by the artist with dedication to the original owner, with label attached to canvas reading, 'Maison de la Pensée Francaise, 2 Rue de L'Elysée, Paris VIII, Larionov: Composition' mixed media on canvasboard 27 x 42cm (10 5/8 x 16 9/16in). PROVENANCE: Acquired directly from the artist c. 1960 Thence by descent Copies of correspondence from Larionov to the original owner are offered together with the present work. One takes the form of an affectionate postcard from Larionov to Mizné asking when he is coming to Paris and emphasising that, 'We are waiting for you.' The other is a letter which begins 'I gave you a painting of mine' and asks for him to send photographs of the reverse and right side as promised.

LOT 204 MIKHAIL FEDOROVICH LARIONOV 1881-1964 SET DESIGN FOR BOVA KOROLEVICH signed with initials in Latin l.r.; further stamped with Lifar's collector's stamp on reverse and inscribed Collection Serge Lifar / Larionow / "Contes russes" de Liadow / rideau gouache, pencil and ink on paper 25 by 34.5cm, 9 3/4 by 13 1/2 in.

Mikhail Larionov (1881-1964) A Parisian Café signed with initials 'M.L.' (lower left) oil on panel 21½ x 26¼ in. (54.5 x 67 cm.) Purchased directly from the artist by Piotr Leszczynski (1885-1971). By descent to the present owner. PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE FRENCH COLLECTION In 1919, Mikhail Larionov moved to Paris and lived with Natalia Goncharova at 16 rue Jacques Callot. Close friends of Albert Vérat and his wife who ran the bistro Le Petit Saint Benoit, Larionov and Goncharova's social lives centred around this place, which welcomed such influential art world figures at the time as Picasso, Braque, Léger and Lifar. Like the Closerie des Lillas and other cafes of Montparnasse and Saint-Germain, this bistro was a place of energy and artistic exchange. This early work by Larionov reveals the influence of this atmosphere, presenting the viewer with a slice of Parisian life at a time when the café was at the centre of social culture. Comparable to other compositions from the 1920s (fig. 1), the present work embodies Larionov's main form of artistic expression during these early years in Paris: his palette is vibrant, his brushstroke undeniably lively. In order to create space and movement from simple colours, Larionov applies pigments with incredible intensity. The costume of the two figures on the left reveals the fashion of the time: 'La Garçonne' as inspired by Coco Chanel, her short hair, cloche hat and fitted dresses. Emerging in the 1920s, this French version of the flapper outfit calls for female emancipation, rights for women and hedonism. Piotr Leszczynski, the original owner of this work, was a broker and was known as a collector of modern art. In Leszczynski's letter (fig. 2) dated 24th June 1920 to his wife Marianna, he mentions the acquisition of this work from the artist: 'I bought for you from a Russian painter Larionov a painting representing a café where we all would go'. The work has remained in the family since its acquisition. A mixture of a genre scene and a vision of Paris when the café was where life was lived, this composition showcases Larionov's early Parisian work with the evident stylistic influence of post-Impressionism.

LARIONOV, MIKHAIL (1881–1964) Une journée de mai Oil on canvas, laid on board, 51.5 by 53.5 cm. Comment1 Provenance: The Everest Collection, Lausanne (label on the reverse). Private collection, Europe. Exhibited: Michel Larionov , Musee des Beaux-Arts, Lyon, 17 March–15 May 1967, No. 25 (label on the reverse). Michel Larionov , Acquavella Galleries, New York, 22 April–24 May 1969, No. 11 (label on the reverse). Rétrospective Larionov–Goncharova , Musee d’’’’Ixelles, Brussels, 29 April–6 June 1976, No. 13 (label on the reverse). Literature: Exhibition catalogue, Michel Larionov , Lyon, Musee des Beaux-Arts, 1967, No. 25, listed. Exhibition catalogue, Michel Larionov , New York, Acquavella Galleries, 1969, No. 11, illustrated and listed. Exhibition catalogue, Rétrospective Larionov–Goncharova , Brussels, Musee d’’’’Ixelles, 1976, No. 13, illustrated. Une journée de mai is one of the masterpieces from Mikhail Larionov’’’’s early period. Painted with amazing purity and clarity of manner, it belongs to the artist’’’’s best canvasses from the middle of the first decade of the 20th century, which are rare even in museums. Few of his paintings from this period, as distinct from his pastels and gouaches, have been preserved. Accordingly, each of them is especially valuable. The artist painted Une journée de mai in 1904 after being sent down for a year from the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture for showing works in the pupils’’’’ exhibition that were “indecent in content”. Over this time spent away from classroom study Larionov, enthralled by the Impressionists he saw in the Moscow collection of I. Shchukin, really began to feel his independence as a painter, and free of academic didacticism. Each summer he set off from Moscow to Tiraspol, to the house of his maternal grandmother where he had spent his childhood. There he would devote himself entirely to works drawn from nature. It is truly impossible to overestimate the importance of these to the story of the artist’’’’s career. Taking over a wing of his grandmother’’’’s house, with its extensive orchard of apricot trees, and converting it into his studio, Larionov created a series of canvasses extolling the everyday life that was going on outside his window. Flowers in pots, lilac bushes, geese and turkeys strutting round the yard became the motifs in his best work of the first five years of the century. Although stylistically most of these pieces, Une journée de mai included, still resemble his early work, in which the influences of Victor Borisov- Musatov and a naturalistic approach to depicting the world still pervade, we are no longer looking at studies as they were understood in 19th century art, but at pictures painted from life that entirely belong to the new century. His conservatories, acacias, roses wet with rain, and even his pigs literally grow out of a study into a self-sufficient composition, even preserving the typically small dimensions of a study and the spontaneous elan with which the paint is applied. It is difficult to find a better example than Une journée de mai of how genres were deliberately mixed. This device became a special characteristic of Larionov’’’’s painting in the first decade of the 20th century. At this time he crosses over from painting still lifes to depicting interiors. These, in turn, are united through open doors and windows with the landscape of garden and street. In its compositional structure, Une journée de mai harks back to Velazquez’’’’s Las Meninas , in which the optical centre of the picture is a mirror reflecting the royal couple Philip IV and Mariana of Austria and in the doorway next to them the figure of Chancellor Olivares. But if in Velazquez this motif is only part of a composition that is, as a whole, much more complex, then in Larionov’’’’s case the borders of window, mirror and real space in combination become sufficient on their own. Their fragmentary nature and juxtaposition generate expression. The feeling is engendered of a wholeness about the world, parts of which are represented by the branches of trees outside the window, the flowers in a vase on the window-sill, the furniture in the room reflected in the mirror, and the things actually present in the picture – a figurine on the mantel and the chair-back which invariably creeps into Larionov’’’’s Tiraspol canvasses. Larionov breaks with the hierarchy of main and subordinate subject. In the composition of Une journée de mai there is no definite centre or, rather, it is constantly shifting, depending on what arrests the attention of the viewer. The world which surrounds the artist within and without is, as it were, flung open on all sides “for a broader outlook”. At the same time the directions in which there is spatial breakthrough are different: the window opening leads the eye into the distance, but the mirror extends the space behind the artist and moves him forward. This fluidity and oscillation of ideas immediately unsettles the mind and imparts to the picture an element of surprise. In this canvas the images of mirror and window – critical in art history – take on the significance of spatial and figurative modulations. The motion of trunks and branches, rendered in long brushstrokes of brown pigment, is extended in undifferentiated, multidirectional brushstrokes of light green that convey the inimitable fuzziness of their appearance in spring. This unstoppable movement of the brush “outside the window” is counteracted by the stillness of the objects depicted behind the looking glass. But all of them – even the twigs in the orchard and the antique furniture in its covers – seem dissolved in a single stream of pearly, diffuse, golden light. The obvious formative hand in Une journée de mai , with its apparently accidental articulation, intellectually conceived composition and inclination towards a generalised colour impression and decorative resolution of the whole, is that of Larionov – both one of the founders of the Russian avant-garde and greatest artists of the 20th century, significantly in advance of his contemporaries.