Lot 233

Charles Camoin

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Description

Charles Camoin
JEUNE MAROCAINE SERVANT LE THÉ
signed Ch. Camoin (lower right)
oil on canvas
25 3/4 by 32 in., 65.4 by 81.3cm.

Provenance

Michel André
Francois van den Broeck d'Obrenan, Paris & Switzerland (acquired from the above)
Galerie Matignon Saint-Honoré, Paris
Acquired from the above by the present owner

Exhibited

Marseille, Musée des Beaux-Arts
NIce, Palais de la Méditerranée, Ch. Camoin, Soixante-dix ans de peinture, 1971, no. 23
Lausanne, Fondation de l'Hermitage & Marseille, Musée Cantini, Charles Camoin Rétrospective, 1997-98, no. 53, illustrated p. 53

Literature

Danièle Giraudy, Camoin, sa vie, son œuvre, Marseille, 1972, p. 87, no. 145, illustrated in colour

Catalogue Note

Camoin visited Morocco with Henri Matisse in 1912. Their discovery brought the two artists closer than ever, deeply affecting each.

Jeune marocaine numbers among Camoin's finest works of this trip, displaying "the exaltation of colour that amplified each painter's vision, and their shared palette... Structurally, the brushstroke is simplified and the colours spread out into zones that break up rich surfaces and costumes..." (Daniele Giraudy, in Charles Camoin, op. cit., p. 54). Morocco enriched the fauve root of both artists. For Camoin, bold, expressive colour and spontaneous gestural brushtrokes would remain key to his later work.

The "odalisque" is a recurrent theme in both artists' work. While in Tangiers, they often depicted local servant girls, whose sensuality offered a rich spectacle of exoticism.