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OIL ON CANVAS
by Jean-Louis BOUSSINGAULT (1883-1943)
France, 1941
THE NOSTALGIC BALLERINA (DANCER)
provenance Charpentier Gallery, 76 rue du Faubourg St. Honore, Paris (now Sotheby's offices)
Large label of the Charpentier Gallery on the back
with frame: 43x35 cm - 16.9x13.8 inches
without frame: 32x24.5 cm - 12.6x9.6 inches
Signed "JL Boussingault" and dated "41" (see photo)
The condition is excellent !
In its period golden frame
Although realized at the end of his existence, a period when Boussingault uses bright and vivid colors to transcribe the happiness he has to cope with life, somewhat liberated from his demons, this work sees him return in part to his former way, that of the exit of the first war, produced by a desolate soul of the misfortunes which overwhelm him. It must be said that the period is dark. In 1940-1941, defeated France struggles to recover from defeat, discouragement fuels the feeling of inevitability. The crazy years are far, the youth of Boussingault also. Here, our ballerina no longer presents a physical conducive to the exercise of his art. Sitting, arms crossed, weary, without object, she is bored and seems to be thinking back to her past. To translate it, Boussingault returns to the sober, brown, gray and ocher colors attenuated by flat tints of pink and blue softened. The form, constructed and affirmed by simple masses, leaves no doubt about the reality of the situation. If the picture fits perfectly to the first degree, the allegory about the situation of France strikes the spirit. Some will see in the nudity of the torso of our dancer (the King is naked!) a contrast to the tutu, a vestige of the past, an allegory on the situation at the time of France divided into two zones, one said occupied in the North and the other free in the South. At the height of his art, Boussingault gratifies us here with an original work of a mastered and achieved neo-realism.
contact : georges@montmartre-montparnasse.com
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