Lot 63
  • 63

Rosa Bonheur

Estimate
20,000 - 30,000 USD
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Description

  • Rosa Bonheur
  • Le marche aux chevaux 
  • signed Rosa Bonheur (lower left)
  • Watercolor and pencil on paper
  • 11 3/4 by 17 3/4 in.; 30.1 by 46 cm
  • 29.8 by 45 cm

Provenance

M.R. Schweitzer Gallery, New York, as Horses and Grooms 
Sale: Sotheby's, New York, May 21, 1987, lot 63
Acquired at the above sale by A. Alfred Taubman

Condition

Surface is slightly dirty with paper somewhat yellowed and faded in areas. Small repair and loss to lower left corner. Paper is hinged at top to backing board.
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.

Catalogue Note

Rosa Bonheur remains today among the most well-known woman artists of the nineteenth century.  Her skill was apparent from an early age, and fostered by her father, also an artist, who trained Bonheur and her sibling in the tradition of a Renaissance workshop.  She was a precocious talent with an affinity for portraying animals, and she demonstrated uncommon devotion to her craft in spite of strict gender codes (even going so far as to dress as a man to gain entrance to traditionally male spaces). After considerable success at the Paris Salon of 1848, she was awarded a coveted state commission to paint Plowing in the Nivernais (1849, Musée d’Orsay, Paris), a critically-acclaimed submission to the 1849 Salon.  Her career soared and she was showered with honors, including that of Officer de la Légion d’Honneur, the premiere order of France, which no woman before had ever received.

Long fascinated with horses, in 1851 Bonheur began to visit the horse market at Boulevard de l’Hôpital near the Asylum of la Salpêtre.  She had received a copy of M. Richard’s Etude de Cheval in 1844 and ever since was focused on perfecting her drawing of the equine form.  As she watched the handlers jogging their horses through the market, Bonheur thought their movements followed those of the Parthenon’s frieze (Dore Ashton, Rosa Bonheur, A Life and a Legend, New York, 1981, p. 82).  Such an impression is evocatively recorded in the present work with its parade of horses on display for appraising onlookers. The form of each animal is varied, recording her observations and boasting of her brilliant technique.  As she explained, “my idea was not to imitate, but to interpret. In this spirit I made innumerable compositions and studies” (as quoted in Ashton, p. 82).  While it stands alone as a realized composition, the present work was most probably an early iteration or conceptual study for Bonheur’s most famous painting, The Horse Fair (1853, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York) and its versions in watercolors including the largest which sold in these rooms on April 18, 2007, lot 114 for $480,000.  The influence of Eugène Delacroix and Théodore Géricault was crucial to the creation of The Horse Fair and the artists’ impact on Bonheur is evident both in the subject and technique of Le Marche aux Chevaux