Sixty Works by Modern Masters - Flipbook - Page 67
Fernand Léger
Fernand Léger
French, 1881 - 1955
Les Trois Sœurs, 1948
Oil on canvas
35¼ x 28¾ inches / 92 x 73 cm
Signed and dated lower right: F.Leger 48
Signed again, titled and dated on the reverse: Composition aux trois soeurs F LEGER 48
During the 1930s, Léger made the
acquaintance of Douglas Cooper,
a renowned British art historian,
critic and collector. As a partner
at the Mayor Gallery in London,
Cooper organised exhibitions that
championed the work of Picasso,
Miró, Klee and Léger in collaboration
with dealers in Paris such as DanielHenry Kahnweiler. He often received
pictures from these artists as tokens
of appreciation.
The present work was one such
gift, and was once a focal point of
the Douglas Cooper Collection at
Castille. It is an excellent example
of Léger’s later work, which carries a
distinctly figurative flavour compared
with his earlier abstractions and
which typically evokes the human
figure on a monumental scale.
Provenance
Douglas Cooper, London
Anon. sale, Sotheby's, London, 1 July 1980, lot 74
Gallery Gertrude Stein, New York
Private collection, Florida
Exhibited
Paris, Musée National d’Art Moderne, Fernand Léger, Exposition retrospective
1905-1949, October-November 1949, no. 86
London, The Tate Gallery, Fernand Léger, February-March 1950, no. 42,
illustrated pl. 12; this exhibition later travelled to Leeds, Leeds City Art
Gallery, no. 35, illustrated pl. 8
Marseille, Musée Cantini, Fernand Léger, June-August 1966, no. 70,
illustrated
Berlin, Staatliche Kunsthalle, Fernand Léger 1881-1955, 1980-81, no. 115,
illustrated p. 457
Literature
Douglas Cooper, Fernand Léger et le nouvel espace, Editions des Trois
Collines, Geneva, 1949, illustrated on the frontispiece
John Richardson, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice: Picasso, Provenance and
Douglas Cooper, New York, 1999, illustrated p.189.
Georges Bauquier, Fernand Léger: Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre peint
1944-1948, vol. VII, Paris, 2000, no. 1289, illustrated p. 204
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