Michel Goldschmidt, Orgeval
Sale: Hôtel Drouot, Paris, June 9, 1995, lot 74
Acquired at the above sale by the present owner

Osaka, Takashimaya Art Gallery; Kyoto, Takashimaya Art Gallery; Yokohama, Takashimaya Art Gallery; Tokyo, Takashimaya Art Gallery; Okayama, The Okayama Prefectural Museum of Art & Gifu, The Museum of Fine Arts, Marc Chagall, La Réminiscence de l’amour, 2012, no. 24, illustrated in color in the catalogue

This work is in overall fair condition. Executed on cream wove paper, laid down on card. The pigment is vibrant and the medium is stable and well-preserved. The sheet is lightly time stained, notably along the extreme perimeter. Remnants of old framers tape visible along the perimeter. There are artist's pinholes in all four corners. There is a 3-inch repaired tear running horizontally in the background from the upper left edge with an associated flattened crease; two further repaired tears visible to the left and below the cockerel's beak and another to the right of the figure's legs. There is one small hole and a thin diagonal scratch toward the lower left corner. Otherwise fine.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Executed circa 1947-48 during the final months of Marc Chagall’s six years in North America, this pastel shoulders a melancholy zeal, unique to this period of the artist’s oeuvre. The ghostly, androgynous central figure is a rare example of a nude employed by the artist. Entwined with emotional and poetic symbolism, this figure is an undoubtable ode to the artist’s late wife Bella who died suddenly in 1944. The ambiguous gender of the nude, which holds a certain likeness to Chagall himself, is shrouded in a nebulous haze of blue, revealing the artist’s own dark introspection, personal demons and emotional fragility at the time. As Meyer states: “Grief for the loss of Bella is fused with sympathy for the events of the war and compassion for the destruction of the Eastern Jewry” (Franz Meyer, Marc Chagall, New York, 1961, p. 470). However, the inclusion of one of Chagall’s most prominent motifs, the rooster, reveals the enchanting creative energy which had begun to take hold of the artist in the years immediately after the war. Composed with a soft, engaging face and strong red plume, the cockerel’s countenance draws the observer’s eye into its own, while it looks supportively at the figure. This is combined with a young sapling growing in the background, colored liberally with spring-like yellows and greens. These two images reveal a sense of the artistic rebirth for Chagall which had burgeoned in the years immediately after the war.

In 1946 a major retrospective of his work was held at 1946 at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The liberation of Paris, Chagall’s adopted and artistic homeland, also bore huge significance for the artist at this time. He was able to spend three months there in 1946, exhibiting at the Musée d'art moderne in the autumn of 1947 and returning for good in the spring of 1948. This work beautifully exudes the emotional rupture within Chagall at a significant juncture in his career, then tormented by the loss of his wife but finally free to return to his creative home and serves as a powerful embodiment of the artist’s spirit in pastels.