Max Ernst

Alexander Iolas Gallery, New York

Acquired from the above by 1958

Venice Biennale, 1954, no. 32 (listed as Donna Fiore )

Houston, Contemporary Arts Museum, The Disquieting
Muse - Surrealism, 1958

Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz-Museum & Zurich, Kunsthaus, Max Ernst, 1962-63, no. 204, illustrated in the catalogue

New York, Flushing Meadows, World's Fair, Texas Pavillion, 1964

New York, Jewish Museum, Max Ernst: Sculpture and Recent
Painting, 1966, no. 98, illustrated in the catalogue

Stockholm, Moderna Museet, Max Ernst, 1969, no. 209, illustrated in the catalogue

Hamburg, Kunsthalle; Hanover, Kestner-Gesellschaft; Frankfurt, Kunstverein; Berlin, Akademie der Künste; Cologne, Kunsthalle; Paris, Les Salles de L'Orangerie; Marseille, Musée Cantini; Grenoble, Maison de la Culture; Strasbourg, Anvienne Douane; Nantes, Musée des Beaux-Arts; Houston, Rice Museum; Kansas City, William Rockhill Nelson Gallery and Mary Atkins Museum; Art Institute of Chicago, Max Ernst: Inside the Sight, 1970-1974, no. 93, illustrated in the catalogue

New York, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Max Ernst: A Retrospective,1975, no. 210, illustrated in the catalogue

Galeries nationales du Grand Palais, Paris. Max Ernst, 1975, no. 254 illustrated in the catalogue

Toronto, Art Gallery of Ontario, Gauguin to Moore: Primitivism in
Modern Sculpture, 1981-82

Tokyo, Isetan Museum; Hiroshima Museum; Yokohama Museum; Yamanshi, Repfecture Museum; Hokaido, Asahikawa Museum & Osaka City Museum, Surrealism, 1983, no. 26, illustrated in the catalogue

Houston, The Menil Collection, Max Ernst: Selections from The
Menil Collection, 1989-90

Houston, The Menil Collection, "The Imagery of Chess" Revisited, 2006-07, supplement to the exhibition, not in catalogue

John Russell, Max Ernst, Life and Work, New York, 1967, no. 139, illustration of another cast n.p.

Werner Spies, Sigrid & Gunter Metken, Max Ernst, Oeuvre-Katalog: Werke 1939-1953, Cologne, 1987, no. 2471.2, illustration of another cast p. 91, illustrations of the plaster and wood versions p. 90

Excellent condition. The bronze is structurally sound and has a uniform brown patina that is in excellent condition. No scratches, abrasions or excessive handling were observed on the surface.
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.

Jeune homme au coeur battant is one of ten sculptures Ernst
completed during the summer of 1944 while staying at the Long Island home of noted Surrealist dealer Julien Levy. It is by far the most distinctive, presenting stylistic and iconographic attributes hitherto unseen in Ernst's sculpture. Ernst's figural sculptures typically derive from fantastic characters, such as the avian creature Loplop, and their features take shape through the artist's playful manipulation of found objects. While Jeune homme au coeur battant, like earlier sculpture, was created by the imaginative transformation of common materials, here the figure is reduced entirely to volumes and curves, with two smooth concavities in lieu of recognizable anatomical formal elements. Ernst attempted this extreme simplification of form in Femme assise, created as a female counterpart to Jeune homme au coeur battant, but the figure was destroyed while still in its plaster state (fig. 2).

While stylistically unique, the production of Jeune homme au coeur battant and Femme assise typifies Ernst's ingenious and resourceful craftsmanship. Jürgen Pech explains that, "Ernst formed the bowed legs of the figures by placing a cylindrical bucket at an angle, inside a bowl with a flat bottom and curved edge, taking a cast of the space in
between and repeating the process, once the first form had dried  The body of the male figure was taken from a cast of a slightly distorted metal box. Ernst then inserted a spoon into the top of this, while the plaster was still wet... The oval form [on the figure's chest] can be interpreted either as arching outwards or as bending inwards, so as to suggest the beating of a heart... Max Ernst used thin curved planes for the heads of both figures, but this time took casts of weighing pans from a set of scales. The heads were attached to long necks, similar to those he had made for An Anxious Friend. Both figures were thus given volume and presence, in marked contrast to their simple clarity and light airiness" (Museo d'Arte Contemporanea, op. cit., p. 93).

Apart from sporadic Dada reliefs and assemblages, sculpture was of minor concern to Ernst until 1934, when Alberto Giacometti exposed him to a Modern style that drew heavily from non-European sources such as African and Native American art. Jeune homme au coeur  battant is closely related to ceremonial spoons made by the Dan people of West Africa. As a further nod to the Dan influence (fig. 1), Ernst executed a version of Jeune homme au coeur battant in mahogany, also in the Menil Collection.  A bronze edition of nine was cast by the Modern Art Foundry in New York.  The present work is one of two bronze casts of this sculpture owned by the Menil Collection.