Aristide Maillol - Modern & Contemporary Art Day Sale, Morning Session New York Wednesday, May 15, 2024 | Phillips

Create your first list.

Select an existing list or create a new list to share and manage lots you follow.

  • Aristide Maillol’s La nymphe aux fleurs, 1931, is a testament to the sensuality and gracefulness of the artist's use of line and form. The present work is one from a series of nymphs created by the artist between 1931 and 1937 in preparation for his groundbreaking three-part sculpture, Les trois nymphes.  The figure is the leftmost form from Les trois nymphes, in which her outstretched hand holds the hand of the central figure, the three nymphs together referencing the Three Graces of Greek mythology. Per the artist’s title, however, these women are not Graces but nymphs of the “flowery meadows.”

     

    According to Olivier Lorquin, the present form was cast before 1952 and probably during the artist's lifetime. In this work, the nymph stands alone, her gaze ahead as if beckoning to an unseen figure in the distance. Having a career-long preoccupation with the female nude, Maillol presents idealized proportions of the figure’s features, again recalling the ancient traditions of the Greeks and Romans. Inspiring other revolutionary artists such as Henry Moore, Maillol is one of the foremost sculptors of the late 19th and early 20th century. Creating his first sculptures around 1895, Maillol quickly gained popularity among collectors, including his contemporary, Auguste Rodin, throughout his lifetime, and his works continue to be sought after to this day.

     

    Aristide Maillol, Les trois nymphes, 1937–1938, Tate, London. Image: © Tate, London / Art Resource

    “Maillol is the equal of the greatest sculptors. What is admirable in Maillol, what is, so to speak eternal, is the purity, the clarity, the limpidity of his workmanship and thought.”
    —Auguste Rodin

    In many ways a celebration of the female figure, the present work emphasizes her perfectly symmetrical features. As noted by John Rewald, “to celebrate the human body, particularly the feminine body, seems to have been Maillol’s only aim. He did this in a style from which all grandiloquence is absent, a style almost earthbound and grave... the absence of movement, however, is compensated by a tenderness and charm distinctively his own.”i Perhaps using his maid, Marie, as his model, Maillol delicately renders her features through smooth lines, accentuating the peaks and valleys of her form in an idealized rendering. Perfectly proportioned, Maillol’s nearly life-sized figure represents the ideals of feminine beauty, a depiction that ties him directly to his predecessors of antiquity.

     

    Torso of Aphrodite, circa 200 BC / 150 AD, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. Image: National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., Gift of Barbara Harrison Wescott in memory of the Hon. Francis Burton Harrison

    Both the strong form and serene grace of the present work recalls the sculptural traditions of the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans. Maillol relies on the same principles of balance, harmony, and proportion in his works to create his idealized figures. This balance is deceptively simple, an attempt to render the female figure through geometric forms and line only, creating a sense of rhythm that flows through the modeled greenish patina. Though stagnant in pose, La nymphe aux fleurs suggests movement, through both her contrapposto stance, a Classical Greek technique, and her delicately raised hand, as if she might reach out towards the viewer in an instant. Utilizing these principles, Maillol creates portraits concerned with preserving and purifying classical tradition, allowing his sculptures to truly transcend time. Indeed, the present work captures this aim – his compositions have a sense of nostalgia to them, creating works that are at once timeless and contemporary.

     

    iJohn Rewald, Aristide Maillol, exh. cat., Rosenberg Gallery, New York, 1958, pp. 6–7.

    • Condition Report

      Request Condition Report
    • Description

      View our Conditions of Sale.

    • Provenance

      Lucien Maillol, Marly-le-Roi
      Cook Fine Art, New York (acquired in 2005)
      Acquired from the above by the present owner on April 1, 2005

    • Exhibited

      Tokyo, Mitsukoshi Museum of Art; Hokkaido, Hakodate Museum of Art; Takamatsu Art Museum; Akita, Chiba Museum of Art; Fukushima Prefectural Museum of Art; Himeji City Museum, Maillol, September 1994–October 15, 1995, no. 63, p. 198 (illustrated)
      Kaoshiung, Museum of Fine Arts, Taiwan, Aristide Maillol, 1996
      Paris, Musée Maillol, Aristide Maillol, July 6–October 26, 1996
      New York and London, C & M Arts, Aristide Maillol, April 10–June 1, 1997, no. 21, n.p. (illustrated)
      Santa Fe, Gerald Peters Gallery, Aristide Maillol, November 20, 1998–February 5, 1999, no. 10, n.p. (illustrated)

    • Literature

      George Waldemar, Aristide Maillol et l'âme de la sculpture, Paris, 1977, pp. 189, 191 (another cast illustrated)
      Dina Vierny, Fondation Dina Vierny, Paris, 1995, pp. 56, 218 (another cast illustrated)
      Bertrand Lorquin, Aristide Maillol, London, 1995, p. 113 (another cast illustrated)

168

La nymphe aux fleurs

incised with the artist's monogram on the top of the base; incised with the foundry mark and inscribed "Épreuve D'Artiste Alexis Rudier Fondeur Paris" along the lower edge of the base
bronze
62 x 20 x 15 1/2 in. (157.5 x 50.8 x 39.4 cm)
Conceived in 1931 and cast by the Alexis Rudier Foundry in Paris before 1952, this work is an artist's proof from an edition of 6 plus 4 artist's proofs.

The authenticity of this work has been confirmed by the late Dina Vierny.

Full Cataloguing

Estimate
$600,000 - 800,000 

Place Advance Bid
Contact Specialist

Annie Dolan
NY Head of Auctions and Specialist, Head of Sale, Morning Session
212 940 1288
adolan@phillips.com

Modern & Contemporary Art Day Sale, Morning Session

New York Auction 15 May 2024