Impressionist & Modern Art Online
Online Auction: 19–28 May 2020 • 3:00 PM CEST • Paris

Impressionist & Modern Art Online 19–28 May 2020 • 3:00 PM CEST • Paris

Sotheby’s Paris is pleased to announce its upcoming Impressionist and Modern Art online auction. The auction will offer a great selection of Impressionist, Post-impressionist, Modern and Surrealist works.

Highlights of the auction include several remarkable works on paper by Pablo Picasso, such as a moving portrait of Olga as well as innovative paper cut outs, shimmering oils by Henri Lebasque, Kees van Dongen and Louis Valtat as well as a selection of Surrealist works, from Francis Picabia to Salvador Dalí.

Featured Highlights

Pablo Picasso
PABLO PICASSO | TWO DRAWINGS: (I) YVETTE GUILBERT; (II) BOUQUET DE FLEURS
Estimate: 50,000 – 70,000 EUR
Picasso's "Yvette Guilbert": Returning to a Painting 50 Years Later
Painted at two different periods, first in 1903 and completed in 1959, this work has a very special history. After having been damaged at the bottom edge, the work was shown to Picasso. The artist decided to intervene and chose the present framing system in order to conceal the area in question. He then executed a flower bouquet at the center of the mount on August 6, 1959 turning this piece into a new and unique work of art.

Yvette Guilbert inspired many artists, from Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec to Théophile-Alexandre Steinlen. When Picasso arrived in Paris in 1900, she was already a celebrity and one of the stars of the legendary Moulin Rouge.

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Pablo Picasso
PABLO PICASSO | ROJAS. LA CÉLESTINE
Estimate: 80,000 – 120,000 EUR
Pablo Picasso and La Celestina
Picasso’s particular fascination with Celestina, a leading character in Fernando de Rojas's novel La Celestina, has deep roots for the artist. Between 1968 and 1971, he created his own vision of this old woman who embodies a procuress caught up in a fated love story.

He notably conceived 66 etchings dedicated to this subject, which are part of Picasso’s 347 Suites. He also executed many works – drawings and oils – related to the same theme, including lot 18 of the present sale. More than strict illustration, these works embody a personal vision of one of the most significant works of Spanish literature, first published in Burgos in 1499.

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The Female Nude: Interpretations

The sale offers a panorama of the female nude and its various interpretations from the Belle Epoque to the 1950s. From more classical representations by Breton and even Picabia, inscribed within the secular tradition of the academic nude, the sale moves on to more innovative modernist interpretations by artists such as Matisse, Le Corbusier, and Villon. The nude female bodies become more abstracted and geometric as the machine age enters the scene. The same transformation is witnessed in sculptures presented in the sale with works ranging from the classical forms of Maillol’s female nudes to Gargallo’s exploration of empty space as means of defining the modern figure.

The Science of Light and Colour: Achille Laugé's Neo-Impressionist Works
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