Georges Rouault

Galerie Fabien Boulakia, Paris
Acquired from the above in 1977 and thence by descent

Munich, Haus der Kunst, Georges Rouault, 1974, no. 46
London, Arts Council of Great Britain & Manchester, City Art Galleries, G. Rouault, 1871-1958, 1974, no. 31

Bernard Dorival & Isabelle Rouault, Rouault, L’Oeuvre peint, vol. II, Monte Carlo, 1988, no. 1278, illustrated p. 38

Executed in 1930, Carmencita belongs to a group of portraits by Rouault depicting dancers, circus performers, lawyers and other members of public society. Unlike Picasso and Toulouse-Lautrec, who portrayed these individuals with pathos, Rouault's approach was unapologetic and raw. Although Rouault was not a formal member of the Fauve movement, he did embrace its primary tenet in his incorporation of an exaggerated palette. In the present work, several layers of pigment can be discerned, the build-up of paints creating a three-dimensionality that characterizes Rouault's strongest oeuvre. Furthermore, the work is highlighted by the deep swaths of black ink delineating the subject, representing a signature element of Rouault’s portraiture of this period. Pierre Courthion aptly writes, "When we examine a Rouault, what strikes us first? Above all, the way the paint has been applied: very thickly and with passion, with great sureness, and with spontaneity...the thickly applied pigment achieves a hitherto unknown degree of energy; every form seems to flow directly from the artist's hand into our own sensibility" (Pierre Courthion, Georges Rouault, New York, 1961, p. 234).