Tête de fou

Details

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)
Tête de fou
signed on the back 'Picasso'
bronze with black patina
Height: 16 in. (40.6 cm.)
Conceived in 1905 and cast before 1953

Literature

C. Zervos, Pablo Picasso, Paris, 1932, vol. I (Oeuvres de 1895 à 1906), no. 322 (another cast illustrated, pl. 148)
U.E. Johnson, Ambroise Vollard Editeur, New York, 1944, p. 144, no. 124
D.-H. Kahnweiler, Les Sculptures de Picasso, Paris, 1948, pl. 2 (another cast illustrated)
G.C. Argan, Sculptura di Picasso, Venice, 1953, pl. IV (another cast illustrated)
W. Boeck and J. Sabartés, Picasso, New York, 1955, p. 460, no. 32 (another cast illustrated)
R. Penrose, Picasso, Amsterdam, 1961, pl. 2 (another cast illustrated)
R. Penrose, The Sculpture of Picasso, New York, 1967, pp. 17, 26, 41 and 221 (another cast illustrated, p. 52)
P. Lecaldano, L'opera completa di Picasso blu e rosa, Milan, 1968, p. 101, no. 175a (another cast illustrated)
W. Spies, Sculpture by Picasso, New York, 1971, p. 301, no. 4 (another cast illustrated, p. 35)
F. Elgar and R. Maillard, Picasso, New York, 1972, p. 35 (another cast illustrated)
J. Leymarie, Picasso: The Artist of the Century, Lausanne, 1972, p. 26 (another cast illustrated)
P. Daix, La vie de Pablo Picasso, Paris, 1977, no. 109 (another cast illustrated, pl. 16)
U.E. Johnson, Ambroise Vollard Editeur, New York, 1977, p. 41 (another cast illustrated, p. 88)
H.L.C. Jaffé, Pablo Picasso, New York, 1980, p. 14 (another cast illustrated, fig. 9)
W. Spies, Picasso: das Plastische Werk, Berlin, 1983, p. 372, no. 4 (another cast illustrated, p. 326)
J. Richardson, A Life of Picasso, New York, 1991, vol. I (1881-1906), p. 348 (another cast illustrated)
C.-P. Warncke, Pablo Picasso, Cologne, 1994, vol. I (The Works 1890-1936), p. 132 (another cast illustrated)

Lot Essay

Picasso's dealer Ambroise Vollard made an unknown number of casts of Tête de fou, probably no more than fifteen, between 1905 and his death in 1939. Although Valsuani is generally considered to be the foundry that Vollard used, the Comité Picasso believes that Susse and Rudier also made casts of Tête de fou, and that the mold was destroyed upon Alexis Rudier's death in 1953. Only a few of the Vollard editions have cast numbers, and it is doubtful that Vollard himself knew their total issue; he kept in his gallery an example of each sculpture, and ordered a cast made whenever a collector or dealer wished to obtain one (U.E. Johnson, op. cit., 1977, p. 41). The casts vary in patination and definition, but are uniform in size.