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42

Property from a European private collection FERNAND LEGER (1881-1955) l'Arbre vert signed and dat...

Currency:USD Category:Everything Else / Other Start Price:NA Estimated At:400,000.00 - 600,000.00 USD
Property from a European private collection FERNAND LEGER (1881-1955) l'Arbre vert signed and dat...
Property from a European private collection
FERNAND LEGER
(1881-1955)
l'Arbre vert
signed and dated "44/F. Leger"
(lower right); signed, dated
and inscribed "l'arbre vert/F.LEGER 44" (on the reverse)
oil on canvas
20 1/8 x 24 1/8 in. (51 x 61 cm)
painted in 1944
Estimate: $400,000-600,000 <p>Provenance
Galerie Louis Carré, Paris
Galerie Louise Leiris, Paris
Collection Jeanne Laurent, Paris
Anon. sale: Hôtel Drouot, Paris, March 25, 1990, lot 62
Acquired at the above sale by the present owner <p>Exhibited
New York, Valentine Gallery, New Paintings, April 9-May 5, 1945, no. 11
Paris, Musée National d'Art Moderne, Fernand Léger: Exposition rétrospective 1905-1949, October 6-November 13, 1949, no.72 <p>Literature
Georges Bauquier, Fernand Léger, Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre peint, 1944-1948, Paris, 1993, vol. 7, p. 18, no. 1160 (illustrated in color, p. 19)
Serge Fauchereau, Fernand Léger: A Painter in the City, New York, 1994, no. 107 (illustrated in color)
Léger arrived in New York in 1940, having fled the German Occupation of France, to find inspiration from the American countryside around his rented cottage near Lake Champlain. His imagery soon adopts the abandoned mechanical elements as well as the abundance of strange and wonderful flora. L'arbre vert is unusual for this period in that it is non-figurative at a time when Léger's focus was returning to include the human form. Instead, L'arbre vert is a compositional exploration of numerous elements that would appear to have a symbolic nature. However, there remains a pictorial narrative implied by the dominance of the tree, the arbitrary circular piece of machinery, the hanging coat and the vivid blue hills in the background. The present painting is also the embodiment of Léger's very own distinctive palette of primary and secondary colors, separated by white, highlighted by black lines, or vividly contrasted against one another. The choice of color is by no means random and can be seen thoughtfully employed in many of his greatest works from this late period. As Thomas M. Messer explains: "In general, quasi-perspective means are used to insinuate depth but are not allowed to impose themselves upon the work as a whole. Through pure color, and its projecting and receding qualities more than through any other single device, Léger achieves an animated spatial effect. As a result of this carefully balanced form-color play, his works live on borrowed depth, and the painting surface remains intact as such" (FERNAND LEGER FIVE THEMES AND VARIATIONS, exh. cat., Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1962, p. 15).
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