Marie Zimmermann

Collection of the artist, New York

John C. Zimmermann, by bequest

Private Collection

Cathers & Dembrosky, New York

Acquired from the above by the present owner, 2001

Parall(elles): A History of Women in Design, Montreal Museum of Fine Art, Montreal, February 18 - May 28, 2023

Deborah Dependahl Waters, Joseph Cunningham, and Bruce Barnes, The Jewelry and Metalwork of Marie Zimmermann, New Haven, CT, 2011, p. 299 (for the present lot illustrated)

Drawing inspiration from diverse sources - from ancient Chinese, Japanese, Roman and Egyptian precedents to the natural world - Marie Zimmermann's work defies clear stylistic classification. A true "artist's artist" and master of many media, she liked to claim that she made "everything from tiaras to tombstones." Zimmermann was born in Brooklyn of Swiss immigrant parents and studied at the Packer Collegiate Institute, the Art Students League, and Pratt Institute. She joined the National Arts Club in New York in 1901, eventually maintaining a studio and then a residence there with her life partner, former actress and screenwriter Ruth Allen, until 1937. In her eclectic style, Zimmermann mastered a wide array of materials ranging from bronze, copper, iron, silver, and gold, as well as precious and semi-precious stones, ivory, pearls, enamel, and glass to create jewelry, tabletop objects, furniture, and objets d'art.

Zimmermann was aware of the challenges of working with wrought iron, so she often engaged with a skilled ironsmith to forge her designs, but distinctive patination was one of her special skills. She experimented with different recipes to achieve a variety of patinas, including the rich matte black finish seen on the present lot.

This monumental eleven-light candelabrum, standing over two feet tall, is one of Zimmermann's most ambitious tabletop works. While the upper half of the candelabrum borders on geometric abstraction, the lower section skews towards the zoomorphic. The vertical column terminates in complex series of gracefully squatted legs and webbed

feet. This confidently balanced object shows Zimmermann at her best: inventive, idiosyncratic and refined. The artist retained this candelabrum for personal use until the end of her life.