Pavel Filonov (1883-1941)
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Pavel Filonov (1883-1941)

Untitled

Details
Pavel Filonov (1883-1941)
Untitled
ink and collage on paper
7 x 8 in. (17.7 x 20.3 cm.)
Provenance
The artist's sister, Evdokia Glebova (1888-1980).
Galerie Gmurzynska, Cologne (label on the backboard).
Acquired from the above by the previous owner in the 1990s.
Anonymous sale; Sotheby's, London, 12 June 2007, lot 123.
Acquired at the above sale by the present owner.
Literature
Exhibition catalogue, Die Physiologie der Malerei; Pawel Filonow in den 1920er Jahren, Cologne, 1992, illustrated p. 51, listed p. 50, no. 6.
Exhibition catalogue, Russische Kunst, Zurich, 2003, illustrated p. 52, listed p. 121, no. 15.
Exhibited
Cologne, Galerie Gmurzynska, Die Physiologie der Malerei; Pawel Filonow in den 1920er Jahren, April-May 1992, no. 6.
Zurich, Art Focus, Russische Kunst, 28 May-31 October 2003, no. 15 (label on the frame).
Special notice
These lots have been imported from outside the EU for sale using a Temporary Import regime. Import VAT is payable (at 5%) on the Hammer price. VAT is also payable (at 20%) on the buyer’s Premium on a VAT inclusive basis. When a buyer of such a lot has registered an EU address but wishes to export the lot or complete the import into another EU country, he must advise Christie's immediately after the auction.
Sale room notice
This Lot is Withdrawn.

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Aleksandra Babenko
Aleksandra Babenko

Lot Essay

Pavel Filonov actively rejected the tenets of Picasso and Braque’s Cubism on the basis that these artists and those who followed them saw the world in the all too limited terms of colour and form with an overemphasis on the mechanical. Strongly opposed to urbanisation, Filonov consistently placed Nature, and by extension Man, at the centre of his work. This distinct approach explains to a large extent the pervasive presence of the human form in his compositions (heads in the case of the present work and in that of Filonov’s first serious painting completed in the winter of 1910–1911) even as his work became progressively more abstract.

Born in Moscow, a precocious child who drew from the age of three or four, Filonov gained admission into the St Petersburg Academy of Arts on his fourth attempt in 1908, only to be expelled two years into his studies for his refusal to accept the establishment’s conservative approach. From 1910–1913 Filonov developed his theory of ‘sdelannost’, a neologism meaning ‘handcrafted’ or ‘madeness’, which placed emphasis on craftsmanship and the composition of every item. The meticulous detail and blocky, carving-like outline of the heads in Untitled exemplify this approach.

On the basis of comparison to similar compositions, it has been suggested that the present work likely dates to between 1922–1925. The combination of Filonov’s premature death on 3 December 1941 during the blockade of Leningrad and his determination to retain his works in order to establish a Museum of Analytical Art makes the appearance of Untitled on the market a rare and significant event.

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