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Impressionist and Modern Art
|
- Sale 6379
Live
| New York
Oct 28 | 11:00 AM EDT
Live
| New York
Sale 6379
| New York
| New York
Estimate$100,000 – $150,000
We wish to thank the Comité Fernand and Nadia Léger for kindly confirming the authenticity of the present lot, which will be accompanied by certificate of authenticity and included in the forthcoming digital Catalogue Raisonné of the artist's work.
Provenance:
Private Collection, Stockholm, Sweden.
Acquired directly from the above by the present owner.
Lot Essay:
In October 1940, fleeing the war in Europe, Fernand Léger settled in New York, a city he had first visited in 1931 and where he remained until the end of the global conflict in 1945.
Léger’s American years proved exceptionally productive. When he returned to France in December 1945, he is said to have shipped back five crates containing some fifty-seven paintings and more than one hundred twenty drawings and studies. Although he remained closely connected to French expatriate circles and resisted full assimilation into American life, Léger was deeply impressed by the country’s energy and industrial vigor. Reflecting near the end of his stay, he observed: “In America you are confronted with power in motion, with force in reserve without end. An unbelievable vitality — a perpetual movement. One has the impression that there is too much of everything.” (Interview with André Warnod, Arts[Paris], January 4, 1946, pp. 1–2; quoted in Simon Willmoth, Léger and America, exh. cat., London and Stuttgart, 1987–88, p. 43).
The present work, executed in 1942, is a design for the cover of Fortune, the magazine founded by Henry Luce, which sought to be “the most beautiful” in American publishing through its collaboration with leading modern artists and photographers such as Diego Rivera, Ben Shahn, Ralston Crawford, Ansel Adams, Walker Evans, and Edward Steichen. Although this design was never published (unlike the cover Léger completed for Fortune the previous year), it marked a renewed engagement with graphic design, a field he had enthusiastically explored after the First World War but largely set aside between 1923 and 1947. The composition reveals how American visual culture reinvigorated his formal vocabulary: against sweeping rays of yellow, red, and blue—colors central to his modernist palette—Léger orchestrates a striking interplay of monumental oil derricks, industrial frameworks, and the colossal head of a man whose direct gaze confronts the viewer. The figure’s stoic presence becomes a silent emblem of humanity’s confrontation with the mounting global tensions of the early 1940s.
To request further details about this lot, please email [email protected]
Framed under glass.
In overall very good condition. The sheet is laid down to the undermat at top left and right corners via two pieces of white paper hinges, allowing us to lift the paper to inspect its verso. The sheet is only slightly toned, with fresh colors. All corners are intact, with pinholes in each of them. Deckled edges along the right outer edge and along the bottom. The remnants of pencil catch the light in a glistening way depending on the angle. Otherwise no sign of restoration, or repair. On the reverse, evidence of old brown glue in each corner. Various evidence of surface soiling. With the number 12 (circle) in blue ballpoint pen. Additional images available upon request.
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Please email [email protected] for any additional information or questions you may have regarding this lot.
