L'Oiseau Multicolore

Braque, Georges

215837 Braque, Georges (after) L'Oiseau Multicolore (Multi-colored Bird) c. 1950 Ma. 1020 17 5/8'' x 24 3/4'' Aquatint in color on Rives wove paper with large margins. Signed in pencil lower right. A rare artist's proof annotated E.A. (epreuve d'artiste) in pencil lower left (aside from the numbered edition of 200 in Arabic number). Published by Maeght, Paris. Printed by Aldo Crommelynck, with the blindstamp of Atelier Lacouriere, Paris, lower left corner. Georges Braque (1882-1963) is considered by the French to represent one of last century's greatest painters. Born in Argenteuil, France, he was the son of a painting contractor who was also a Sunday painter. He had his first art lessons from his father, from whom he learned to imitate marble, wood and gilt surfaces in his paintings. Braque then studied at the school of Fine Arts in Le Havre before going to Paris, where he studied with Bonnat. There, he discovered African, Egyptian, and Greek sculpture at the Louvre. Braque was also influenced by the Impressionists and by his contemporaries, Matisse and Derain, whose Fauve movement he joined in about 1905. By 1907, the architectural influence of Cezanne had asserted itself and Braque, with Picasso, founded the Cubist movement. He began to paint in muted colors and in the geometrical patterns, inverted perspective, and overlapping volumes associated with Cubism. Picasso and Braque worked closely together until the outbreak of World War I. Sometimes they produced works so similar that the two artists themselves could not tell which one had painted a given picture if it had not been immediately signed. They also cooperated on both the analytical and synthetic stages of Cubism and on the collages that prevented Cubism from becoming overly formal: the glued-on material necessitated simplification of style. Braque was mobilized into the French Army in 1914. After a head wound made him temporarily blind in 1915, he could not paint again until 1917. He began to develop a new and more personal style. He used a brighter palette and freer manner that was less angular and more luminous. By 1931 he had found a marvelous balance between intelligence and sensitivity, technique and inspiration. Braque painted a world that combined harmonious shadings of color, sinuous line, and more rounded form, with the multiple points of view and inverted space of Cubism. The resulting landscapes, figure paintings, and still lifes, display lucidity, intellectuality, and restrained emotion. These qualities, as natural to Braque as his quiet manner, prompted the French government to proclaim him the "most French of all French artists of his generation". In 1961, he became one of the few living artists to ever be given a public exhibition at the Louvre.

Reg. No.

215837

Size

17 5/8" x 24 3/4"

Medium

AQUATINT

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