Aristide Maillol

Private Collection, Germany
John Rewald & Dina Vierny, Paris (acquired from the above in 1958)
Charles & Rose Wohlstetter, New York (acquired from the above on November 19, 1969 and sold: Sotheby's, New York, November 8, 2006, lot 115)
Acquired at the above sale

New York, Perls Gallery, Aristide Maillol, 1970, n.n.

Denys Chevalier, Maillol, Paris, 1970, illustration of another cast p. 42
Waldemar George, Maillol, Paris, 1971, illustration of another cast p. 68
Waldemar George, Aristide Maillol et l'âme de la sculpture, Neuchâtel, 1977, illustration of another cast p. 152

The work is in excellent condition. The work features a mottled green and brown patina. The surface is clean. The work is mounted to a wooden base. There are a few pindot accretions, 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.

This beautifully nuanced female torso is directly related to Maillol's full-bodied sculpture of 1905, La Méditerranée. In preparation for both these works, Maillol had rendered several preliminary drawings, reliefs and small maquettes. The present work focuses on the part of the anatomy which fascinated him most. The isolated torso demonstrates Maillol's ability to single-out elements of the body and reveal their solitary beauty. One is often reminded of idealized figures of Greco-Roman sculpture when considering Maillol's work, and this sculpture in particular is evocative of some of the most legendary examples of Antiquity; yet there is something distinctly modern about Torse de la Méditerranée in its unadorned simplicity. Through the subtlest twist of his figure's hips, Maillol is able to convey the power and strength of a fully formed body.  

Bertrand Lorquin writes that, "Maillol was indeed the first to make the giant step into modern art, considering the art work as an end in itself. Gide was not wrong to call Maillol the inventor of silence in sculpture. As another writer, Claude Roy, was later to say, 'Rodin invented a speechless universe filled with a thousand shouts, and the wordless mouths of the creatures he gave birth to will never stop gasping their unappeasable wail of woe throughout time. Maillol opens the gates of an orchard's realm of silence where shrilling cicadas and murmuring springs weave their torpid terror round Eve and invisible Adam.' The work has no message other than its inwardness.  Maillol heralds Brancusi's radically simplified volumes and Henry Moore's dislocations" (Bertrand Lorquin, Maillol, New York, 2002, p. 48).