Fernand Léger

Lucien Rosengart Collection, Nice
Jeffrey H. Loria & Co., New York
Acquired from the above in 2006

Jean Cassou & Jean Leymarie, Fernand Léger, Drawings and Gouaches, New York, 1973, no. T70, illustrated p. 177

Executed on cream wove paper, taped into a window mat along the top edge of the verso. There are a few minor nicks in the surface mostly along the extreme bottom corners and along the centre of the top edge. There are artist's pinholes on the centre and corners of the top edge. Another larger, possibly intentioned, pin hole on the bird's peak. There is a quarter inch tear just below the signature and some minor surface dirt along the bottom edge. On the verso the top and side edges are reinforced with tape and there are numerous studio stains. There is also an inscription of authentication by Nadja Leger. Otherwise the work is in good condition.
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After a period of working with abstract imagery, Léger returned to the use of realistic subjects for his paintings in the 1940s and 50s.  Léger did not view this change as a rejection of the aims of abstraction, however, but rather as a way of continuing to pursue the aims of pure painting with a new vocabulary.  Léger wrote in 1950, "New subjects, envisaged with the contribution of the freedoms that previous experimentation has offered, must emerge and establish themselves."  The goals were still the same, according to Léger, whether the image included objects from the everyday world or was completely abstract,  "The plastic life, the picture, is made up of harmonious relationships among volumes, lines, and colors.  These are the three forces that must govern works of art.  If, in organizing these three essential elements harmoniously, one finds that objects, elements of reality, can enter into the composition, it may be better and may give the work more richness.  But they must be subordinated to the three essential elements mentioned above" (Beth Handler, Fernand Léger, (exhibition catalogue), Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1998, p. 247).