Edward Cucuel

Sale: Sotheby's, New York, June 6, 1997, lot 9, illustrated
Acquired at the above sale

The following condition report was kindly provided by Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc.: This painting is unlined. The tacking edge on the top of the work has been reinforced. The paint layer is clean and varnished. There are no retouches visible either to the naked eye or under ultraviolet light. The heavy paint layer is stable and in excellent condition.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

Born in San Francisco, Cucuel studied at the San Francisco School of Design and worked for the local newspapers The Examiner and Call. He continued his training in Paris in the 1880s, at the Académie Colorossi and the Académie Julian, and finally at the École des Beaux-Arts. It was in Paris that Cucuel developed a successful career as a freelance illustrator for several European journals, including Le Figaro, L'Illustration, The Illustrated London News, and Illustrierte Zeitung. In 1899 he moved to Berlin where he met his future wife, the artist Clare Lotte von Marcard.

Cucuel began focusing on painting in 1907, after meeting the Impressionist painter Leo Putz. The two artists spent summers together at Putz's Hartmannsdorf Castle, where they hired models to pose for them in the grounds of the estate. Later, Cucuel moved his studio to Munich, by now enjoying great success in Germany. From 1918 he and his family summered at their house on the shores of Lake Starnberg in Bavaria, likely the setting of the present work; the garden and the lake beyond provided the backdrop to Cucuel’s carefree summer scenes of beautiful, fashionably dressed young women boating, bathing and picnicking en plein air. Capturing a serene moment of the figure in nature, Reclining Woman in White and works like it were eagerly received, evoking as they did a peaceful world when much of Europe was at war.