Property from the Collection of Mr. Henry M. Reed For Robert and Sonia Delaunay painting was a means of celebrating the modern collective experience. Whether looking at an immense structure (the Eiffel Tower) or watching a crowd dancing at a café, they sought to create a new pictorial reality through pure painting and the interplay of color. This reality could inspire a new physical experience transporting the viewer to a higher level of consciousness. Virginia Spate points out that in contrast to other non-figurative artists who were inspired by mysticism, Robert Delaunay and Fernand Léger believed that a spectator's "profound experience" through perception could lend to a greater self-awareness (V. Spate, Orphism: The evolution of non-figurative painting in Paris 1910-1914, New York, 1979, p. 160-161.) The poet Guillaume Apollinaire called the Delaunay's paintings at the 1913 Salon des Indépendents "Orphist", declaring that 'du Cubisme sort un noveau cubisme le règne d'Orphée commence'. In addition to poetry, Orphism embraced music, movement, color, and light. This search for an unconscious, ineffable experience would lead non-objective painting to new frontiers. Delaunay's fascination with light was the powerful impetus that directed him towards non-objective painting. The Eiffel Tower and Saint Severin series marked what the artist regarded as his "destructive" period and he began fracturing and reassembling these architectural structures into new dynamic forms. In these works the influence of the Cubists is apparent, but Delaunay would go beyond his predecessors by delving further into the exploration of color. At first Delaunay described form with transparent and shaded planes, as seen in the drawings of La Tour Eiffel et la Roue (see lot 119). These simple light and dark planes evolved into veils of pure color in the La Fenêtres series that the artist began in 1912. By incorporating many perspectives simultaneously, and moreover, by collapsing different points in time together through deconstruction, Delaunay arrived at a visual language that would inspire the Der Bleue Reiter artists in Germany, the Futurists in Italy, and the Synchromists in America. Robert Delaunay once referred to his wife and partner as his "animatrice", and it was indeed Sonia who guided him to the themes of the modern world. Stylistically, she would also foster Delaunay's use of color construction and her painting, Le Bal Bullier, 1913 (coll. Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris), displays her strong voice as a colorist. Amidst the dancing figures are circular rhythms or "simultaneous contrasts," a reference to a series the artist commenced in 1912. Together the Delaunays pursued the study of color with Michel-Eugene Chevreul's theory as their foundation. Their focus on color contrasts and exploration of "simultaneity" in painting would also lead Robert to a more transcendent style of pure painting devoid of any representational forms. Throughout her career, Sonia would pursue this style through large-scale murals, illustrations, and textile design. Apollinaire once commented about the couple's steadfastness stating that they rose in the morning "talking painting." They shared a true passion for each other's work. This group of drawings from the collection of Henry M. Reed represents a peak of historic achievement in the lives of both Robert and Sonia Delaunay. It is clear from their first meeting in 1908 or 1909 until Robert's death in 1941, that they were partners in their lives and the art of their times.

Robert Delaunay (1885-1941)

L'Équipe de Cardiff

Details

Robert Delaunay (1885-1941)
L'Équipe de Cardiff
colored wax crayons on paper laid down on board
11 x 7 in. (28 x 17.8 cm.)
Drawn in Paris, 1913

Provenance

Sonia Delaunay, Paris.
Acquired from the above by the present owner, 1971.

Literature

P. Francastel and G. Habasque, Robert Delaunay, Du cubisme à l'art abstrait, Paris, 1957, nos. F.160 and 357.

Exhibited

Frankfurt, Kunstverein, June 1962, no. 68.

Lot Essay

Robert Delaunay did not entirely abandon figuration after 1912. With the Équipe de Cardiff series the artist began incorporating more figurative elements, in this case soccer players in motion. A photograph published in 1913 in the French newspaper, Vie au grand air, was thought to have prompted the artist to undertake this series. Additionally, Umberto Boccioni's lively depictions of rugby players may also have been an inspiration to Delaunay.

The present drawing is a study for the highly finished painting, L'Équipe de Cardiff (see fig. 1; coll.), which was exhibited at the Salon des Indépendants in 1913. Delauany, himself, described the painting as "the first great example of color construction applied to a large area." "The modern elements, the poster, the great wheel, the tower, take part in the game of the footballers, of the bodies which weave together in life. Their relative spaces, their movement are a part of the general movement of the painting; there are no dead, no descriptive parts." (V. Spate, Orphism: the evolution of non-figurative painting in Paris 1910-1914, New York, 1979, p. 205). By unifying all of these elements, Delaunay celebrates the collective experience of being a spectator in the modern world.

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