Provenance
Private Collection, Westchester, New York
Sotheby’s, London, 5 May 1965, lot 79
Private Collection
Sotheby’s, London, 28 November 1995, lot 265
Helly Nahmad, London
Acquired from the above by the present owner
Literature
Werner Spies, Max Ernst Oeuvre-Katalog Werke 1939-1953, vol. 5, Cologne, 1987, no. 2418, p. 60 (illustrated)
Catalogue Essay
Max Ernst’s Le Surréalisme et la peinture is an exquisite Surrealist pastel dating from 1942, when the artist was based in New York. A study for the celebrated oil painting of the same title, housed in the Menil Collection in Houston, Le Surréalisme et la peinture provides an insight into Ernst’s unbounded and inspired psyche, as well as his working methods. Ernst’s composition, with the sinuous, interlocking forms of the nestling birds, displays the artist’s expansive exploration into the unconscious whilst reflecting his provocative interpretation of the external world. The figures are gracefully huddled at the forefront of the composition, their accented fluid tones set against the cool blue of the skyline. Around the smallest of these birds in particular lingers a sense of the anthropomorphic, of human limbs arcing back and forth. Humanistic yet bird-like in their presence, the identity of these creatures is deliberately left to the imagination of the viewer, revealing the power of Ernst’s ability to conjure natural yet fantastical visions from his subconscious.

Le Surréalisme et la peinture was created at a tumultuous time for Ernst. He was living in New York, having escaped from the carnage and confusion of the Second World War, which had seen him repeatedly arrested as a foreign national. His marriage to the wealthy collector and gallerist Peggy Guggenheim was coming to an end, while his relationship with Dorothea Tanning, the young artist who would a few years later become his fourth wife, was blossoming. Ernst had few collectors during this period, yet his works and ideas found fertile ground in the up-and coming generation of avant garde artists working in New York at the time. Le Surréalisme et la peinture, a highly-finished work in its own right, was a pivotal study for one of the masterpieces of the influential surrealist’s oeuvre. The larger painting of the same title was painted for the legendary First Papers of Surrealism exhibition in New York, which was organized by Marcel Duchamp and featured around thirty artists, propelling the Surrealists to the forefront of the avant garde in the United States. The larger picture showed the huddled bird-like creatures on the left, with one of them extending a limb and appearing to paint a picture that appears like some impossible cosmic map. Le Surréalisme et la peinture reflected Ernst’s profound preoccupation with automatism, which was showcased through a number of techniques, including the craft of creating a picture within-a-picture, by dripping paint from a can suspended by a string and set in motion, pre-empting Jackson Pollock’s works.

In Le Surréalisme et la peinture, the artist’s refined technical ability finds a point of convergence with his imagination, represented by these humanistic bird-like creatures. As such, Le Surréalisme et la peinture shares both its title and preoccupations with André Breton’s groundbreaking essay of 1928. The present work clearly explores the author’s concern with an internal model and automatism in art, ‘pure psychic automatism, by which one proposes to express, either verbally, in writing, or by any other manner, the real functioning of thought’ (André Breton, Manifeste du surréalisme, Éditions du Sagittaire, 15 October 1924). The final painting, considered one of Ernst’s greatest contributions to this debate on automatism, displays the importance Ernst placed on Breton’s discourse. Breton praised the emphasis that Ernst in particular placed on automatism, noting that the only form that relates to the synthesis of sensuous and rational roles is graphic self-expression freed from control. The present work exemplifies this, while also highlighting Ernst’s ‘own particular mixture of activity and passivity’ (Werner Spies, Max Ernst Werke 1939-1953, vol 5., 1987, p. VIII).

The protagonists, three bird-like figures worked in satin tones, are affectionately intertwined against a gradated tranquil blue landscape. Ernst’s preoccupation with birds harked back to his childhood and in particular the birth of his sister on 5th January 1906, which coincided with the death of his beloved pet parrot Hornebom. The artist came to believe that his parrot had been reincarnated as his newly born sister, and from that point onwards conflated and confused humans and birds. Ernst himself came to identify with birds throughout his oeuvre: they had first emerged as a recurring theme during his early involvement with the Dada movement in Cologne in the late 1910s. One of Ernst’s most important motifs, the bird revealed the depth of his imagination and personality, eventually materializing as Loplop, the artist winged alter-ego, around 1927 - 1928. By 1942, the year of the present works execution, Ernst was penning his Surrealist autobiography, within which he highlighted his magical birth as an eagle, ‘his first contact with the sensible world, when he came out of the egg which his mother had laid in an eagle’s nest and which the bird had brooded for seven years’ (Max Ernst, quoted in "Some Data on the Youth of M.E. As Told by Himself", View 2, no. 1, 1942, p. 28).

Le Surréalisme et la peinture appears to be an instinctive composition, revealing the innermost workings of the artist’s creative mind. This is one of a group of studies executed in 1942 which explore distorted, hybrid, bird-like figures arranged in differing harmonious configurations, culminating in the painting in Houston. One of these, Maternity, a monochromatic chalk drawing in the collection of The Museum of Modern Art, New York, presents two bird-like figures clearly linked to those in the present work. In title, Maternity directly references and explores the notion of familial, maternal and paternal instincts, providing the viewer with an additional context within which to frame Le Surréalisme et la peinture, in which two larger birds are sheltering the smaller one. This highlights the artist’s masterful ability to translate verbal and theoretical themes into visual imagery whilst channelling his own deeply personal memories and interventions.

29

Max Ernst

Le Surréalisme et la peinture

signed 'Max Ernst' lower right
pastel on paper
54.4 x 44 cm (21 3/8 x 17 3/8 in.)
Executed in 1942.

Estimate
£350,000 - 450,000 ‡♠

Sold for £429,000

Contact Specialist
Henry Highley
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+ 44 20 7318 4061 hhighley@phillips.com

20th Century & Contemporary Art Evening Sale

London Auction 8 March 2018

1
Jack Whitten
Bright Moments: For R.R. Kirk
Estimate £200,000 - 300,000 ‡
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2
Lynette Yiadom-Boakye
Politics
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3
Wolfgang Tillmans
Greifbar 27
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4
Gilbert & George
The Man
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5
Allen Jones
T-riffic
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6
Henry Moore
Family Group
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7
Marino Marini
Piccolo Cavaliere
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8
Henry Moore
Two Three-Quarter Figures on Base
Estimate £400,000 - 600,000 ‡♠
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9
Henri Matisse
Nu allongé I (Aurore)
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10
Pablo Picasso
La Dormeuse
Estimate £12,000,000 - 18,000,000 ‡♠
Sold for £41,859,000
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11
Lucian Freud
Small Naked Portrait
Estimate £400,000 - 600,000 ‡♠
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12
Cy Twombly
Untitled
Estimate £500,000 - 700,000 ‡
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13
Marlene Dumas
The Pilgrim
Estimate £1,500,000 - 2,000,000 ‡♠
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14
Mark Bradford
Helter Skelter I
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15
Luc Tuymans
Singing in the Rain
Estimate £500,000 - 700,000 ‡♠
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16
Albert Oehlen
Untitled
Estimate £250,000 - 350,000 ♠
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17
Georg Baselitz
P.D. Idol
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18
Anselm Kiefer
Die Meistersinger
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19
Sigmar Polke
Untitled
Estimate £800,000 - 1,200,000 ‡♠
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20
Albert Oehlen
Omegasachen-35
Estimate £400,000 - 600,000 ‡♠
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21
Rudolf Stingel
Untitled
Estimate £4,000,000 - 6,000,000 ‡♠
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22
Yves Klein
Monochrome rose sans titre (MP 27)
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23
David Hockney
Bridlington Violets
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24
George Condo
Woman & Man
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25
Cindy Sherman
Untitled #220
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26
Jean-Michel Basquiat
Untitled
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27
Jean Dubuffet
Profil Genre Aztèque
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28
Max Ernst
Colombe blanche
Estimate £350,000 - 500,000 ♠
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29
Max Ernst
Le Surréalisme et la peinture
Estimate £350,000 - 450,000 ‡♠
Sold for £429,000
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30
This lot is no longer available.
31
Marcel Duchamp
Feuille de vigne femelle
Estimate £300,000 - 400,000 ♠
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32
Andy Warhol
Diamond Dust Shoes (Pink)
Estimate £1,400,000 - 1,800,000 ‡
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33
This lot is no longer available.
34
Damien Hirst
Beautiful, Half a Red Headless Centipede (Painting)
Estimate £250,000 - 350,000 ‡♠
Sold for £273,000
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35
Sean Scully
Grey Red
Estimate £600,000 - 800,000 ‡♠
Sold for £1,149,000
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36
Pierre Soulages
Peinture 130 x 162 cm, 12 mai 1965
Estimate £800,000 - 1,200,000 ♠
Sold for £933,000
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37
Manolo Millares
Cuadro 128
Estimate £100,000 - 150,000 ‡♠
Sold for £206,250
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38
Raymond Hains
Tôle
Estimate £150,000 - 200,000 ‡♠
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39
Roman Opałka
OPALKA 1965/1 – ∞ DETAIL 5210331 - 5226270
Estimate £400,000 - 600,000 ‡♠
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40
Enrico Castellani
Superficie bianca
Estimate £250,000 - 350,000 ‡♠
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41
Lucio Fontana
Concetto spaziale, Attese
Estimate £650,000 - 850,000 ‡♠
Sold for £669,000
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42
Jesús Rafael Soto
Métal sur le Losange
Estimate £180,000 - 250,000
Sold for £321,000
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43
Günther Uecker
Reihung
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44
Jan Schoonhoven
R72-73-M-14
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45
Lucio Fontana
Concetto spaziale
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46
Josef Albers
Homage to the Square
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Sold for £381,000
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47
Adrian Ghenie
Found
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48
Damien Hirst
Without You
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49
Damien Hirst
Apparition
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50
Cecily Brown
Skulldiver II
Estimate £400,000 - 600,000 ‡♠
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20th Century & Contemporary Art Evening Sale

London Auction 8 March 2018

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Provenance

Literature

Catalogue Essay

29

Max Ernst

Le Surréalisme et la peinture

20th Century & Contemporary Art Evening Sale

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