Vénus (sans collier)

Details

Aristide Maillol (1861-1944)
Vénus (sans collier)
signed with monogram (on the top on the base); inscribed with foundry mark 'Alexis Rudier.Fondeur. Paris' (on the back on the base)
bronze with green patina
Height: 65½ in. (167 cm.)
Conceived in 1928; this bronze version cast at a later date

Provenance

Galerie Dina Vierney, Paris.
Acquired from the above, May 1964.

Literature

J. Rewald, Maillol, Paris, 1939, p. 165 (another cast illustrated, pl. 63).
W. George, Maillol, Paris, 1971, p. 21 (another cast illustrated, p. 22).
W. George, Aristide Maillol et l'âme de la sculpture, Neuchâtel, 1977, p. 245 (another cast illustrated in color, p. 121).
B. Lorquin, Aristide Maillol, London, 1995, pp. 107 and 198 (another cast illustrated in color, p. 109).

Special notice

On occasion, Christie’s has a direct financial interest in lots consigned for sale. This interest may include guaranteeing a minimum price to the consignor which is secured solely by consigned property. This is such a lot.

Lot Essay

While visting the Louvre with Count Kessler one day, Maillol stopped in front of a statue of Venus which had lain in the sea off the coast of Africa for so long that its details had been rounded and simplified by the action of waves. Turning to his patron, the sculptor explained, "This figure shows me what is the essential plastic quality of a work of art. A sculpture must be beautiful even after the original surface has been lost and it has been worn down like a sea shell. This means that the essence of beauty endures all the same when one is in the presence of a true sculpture which possesses this miracle of harmony between the masses" (B. Lorquin, op. cit., 1995, pp. 107 and 111).

In his quest for beauty through the prefection of line and simplicity of form the artist was continuily forced to revise and refine the female form. Of the present work the artist wrote:

I waited fifteen years for the line of my Venus' legs. I added plaster... I removed it... I put it back. I had misgivings about it. All in vain! One fine day after fifteen years of this constantly renewed, constantly wasted labor punctuated by long periods of silence, after getting back (to Marly-le-Roi) from Banyuls, as I was standing in front of the statue which I had not set eyes on in six months, the line suddenly came to me... God knows, it looked simple enough. I've been working on this statue for fifteen years and all that's lacking now are the arms. They're clear in my mind. Now I have to position them. (Quoted in ibid, p. 107)

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