Andrew Wyeth 1917 - 2009

Whistler's Daughter Art Gallery, Basking Ridge, New Jersey, 1981
Sold: Skinner, Boston, Massachusetts, November 19, 1987, lot 196, illustrated
Private Collection, Edgemont, Pennsylvania (acquired from the above sale)
Private Collection, Shibuya, Japan, 1989
Private Collection, Tampa, Florida, 1991
Frank Fowler, Lookout Mountain, Tennessee
Private Collection, Atlanta, Georgia, 1996 (sold: Sotheby's, New York, May 23, 2007, lot 6, illustrated)
Babcock Galleries, New York (acquired from the above sale)
Private Collection, New York, 2007

Morristown, New Jersey, The Peck School, Three Generations of Wyeths, May 1983
Bologna, Italy, Gallerie Forni, Andrew Wyeth, March-May 1992, no. 12, p. 31, illustrated in color
Nagoya, Japan, Aichi Prefectural Museum; Tokyo, Japan, Bunkamura Museum of Art; Fukushima, Japan, Fukushima Prefectrual Museum of Art; Kansas City, Missouri, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Andrew Wyeth Retrospective, February-November 1995
Charlotte, North Carolina, Jerald Melberg Gallery, Andrew Wyeth: Watercolors, October-November 2004
Palm Springs, California, Palm Springs Art Museum, Andrew Wyeth in Perspective, October 2011-January 2012

The Magazine Antiques, November 1987, p. 944, illustrated in color
Andrew Wyeth, Andrew Wyeth: Autobiography, Old Saybrook, Connecticut, 1995, p. 122, illustrated in color
Anne Classon Knutson, Andrew Wyeth: Memory and Magic, New York, 2005, pp. 71-2, illustrated in color fig. 62

This work is in very good condition. The paper is hinged at the upper corners and affixed at the edges. There is a waviness to the paper that is inherent to the artist's materials and technique, and there is slight mat burn visible at the lower left edge.
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.

French Connection was painted in Andrew Wyeth's father N.C.'s studio in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. Executed in 1980, the work depicts one of the costumes N.C. maintained as props for his celebrated illustrations. Wyeth explained of his chosen subject in 1995, "the costume—an authentic one—was owned by an aide to Napoleon III. The uniform reminded me of the Marquis de Lafayette. You know, he had soil from the Brandywine Valley put in his coffin in France. Notice up on the right side the sail of an American sloop of war. The painting is all about my strong feelings for the American Revolutionary War, the aura of which surrounds me here and which I feel from my constant wandering around these hills in the Brandywine Valley" (Andrew Wyeth: Autobiography, Old Saybrook, Connecticut, 1995, p. 122).

Wyeth inherited his father's fascination with story characters and costumes, which had been instilled in the elder Wyeth by his teacher Howard Pyle. Pyle held a lifelong interest in the theater and both he and N.C. collected historical costumes that they used in their illustrations for stories such as The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood and The Last of the Mohicans. The woods surrounding the Wyeth home in Chadds Ford became Wyeth's private Sherwood Forest, where he and his siblings would reenact storybook adventures dressed in costumes from the chests in their father's studio. Yet Wyeth's own interest in costumes ultimately transcended his father's use of the garments as decorative props, as he elevated them to the subjects of his works in and of themselves.

Anne Classon Knutson writes, "Wyeth delights in the craftsmanship of antique garments...he gives life to these finely wrought vestments symbolically reviving the dead as he carefully constructs the coats in paint. In French Connection, an antique style jacket hangs on a doorjamb, mimicking a standing figure. The jacket, which flares at the waist as if stretched out by an abundant stomach, reminded Wyeth of the Marquis de Lafayette...thus the vintage costumes in his paintings may vivify memories of the people, events, and places that the clothes once served. That many were owned by N.C. Wyeth and his teacher Howard Pyle gives Wyeth a further material connection to his own past. The emtombing atmosphere of the painting...contains memories of war and of his father, while the thresholds provide an escape and a reminder of how easily memories slip way" (Andrew Wyeth: Memory and Magic, New York, 2005, p. 72).