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Lot Essay
Although known through Clément's enthusiastic description (op. cit., 1868 & 1879, p. 104) as one of the 'deux superbes compositions à la pierre noire sur papier bleu avec du lavis et des rehauts de gouache à M. Eudoxe Marcille', Noir sur un cheval cabré was published for the first time by Grunchec in 1982 in his lavish Géricault. Dessins et Aquarelles de Chevaux (op. cit.), and thereafter presented to a wider public at the celebrated Master Drawings by Géricault exhibition which began at The Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, and later travelled to the San Diego Fine Arts Gallery and the Museum of Fine Arts Houston in 1985. In his review of the exhibition, Eitner included this drawing among the 'works of capital importance... that once belonged to the collector Franois Marcille, passed into the collection of Eudoxe Marcille after 1857, and in 1924 were owned by a descendant who, in 1924, lent most of them to the centennial exhibition organised by Trévise and Dubaut. Since then [these drawings] have been guarded by their owners in ways that prevented exhibition and study: like a submerged treasure of known location yet frustratingly beyond reach, these famous but invisible drawings have long teased the curiosity of students of Géricault...' (op. cit., p. 56). Noir sur un cheval cabré is one of the jewels of this 'submerged treasure'.
Brought back into the spotlight by Grunchec's publication and exhibition, Noir sur un cheval cabré still conceals its meaning and iconography, which remain uncertain. Clément was tempted to identify the present drawing as an episode of the Madagascan War although Grunchec's and Eitner's association of the Noir to Géricault's epic interpretation of the revolt of San Domingo is now more widely accepted (op. cit., 1982, p. 72). This stunning watercolour is thus a work of the imagination, executed by the artist from the fascinating stories related by his friend Colonel Bro, whose first mililitary campaign took place during the revolt of San Domingo. As Grunchec points out in the catalogue of the exhibition Master Drawings by Géricault (op. cit., p. 107), 'There exists in a private collection a watercolor inspired by the same source, inscribed by Géricault to his friend Colonel Bro: T. Gericault à son voisin Mr Bro' (fig. 2). Colonel Bro was one of the artist's closest friends, captured by Ary Scheffer in his Portrait de Géricault sur son lit de mort, 'affalé sur une chaise.. la tête sur son bras appuyé au dossier... l'ami qui se montra le plus fidèle' (G. Bazin, Géricault, Paris, vol. I, 1987, p. 209). Inspired by Bro's vivid recollections, Géricault portrayed his friend in a drawing which shares the Noir's boldly vigorous brushstroke, as well as the date - most certainly 1818-1819, as suggested by Grunchec: 'Nous proposerions volontiers d'adopter une datation intermédiaire, contemporaine de l'exécution des lithographies de 1818-1819 et de certains dessins à sujets militaires, stylistiquement et techniquement très voisins' (op. cit., 1982, p. 72).
In Noir sur un cheval cabré Géricault exploited the potential of a vibrant monochromatic, almost grisaille, palette loaded with chiaroscuro passages of great beauty. The subtle nuances of greys and blues are highlighted by the pezzo di bravura of the unusual rose colour of the rider's cap.
The watercolour is iconographically very important because of Géricault's portrayal of a black man and his elevation of the subject to an heroic level. Clément connected the Noir to Géricault's radical projects for the Traite des Noirs (1820-24). As the glorious warrior dominating Stanford's drawings (Porte-étendard noir, Stanford, University Art Museum, fig. 3), the noble protagonist of this watercolour is the formal pendant to the central figure of Géricault's masterpiece, the Radeau de la méduse (Paris, Louvre, fig. 1). In the Radeau de la méduse Géricault, regardless of historical facts, included three black men among the shipwrecked. He entrusted one of them with the role of giving the distress signal that embodied collective hope: everything in the Radeau is a reference to Africa, including the slave trade, and the painting is a few months ahead of the militant revival of abolitionism (see the section 'Le travail de l'idéologie', in Géricault. Conférences et colloques, Louvre, Paris, 1996, pp. 529-617).
His celebration of blackness is, as R. Michel observed, 'de nature héroïque, au contraire d'un Orient rêveur, qui se repaît de nostalgie. Héroïsme combatif: ses effigies de noirs sont des effigies belliqueuses, cavalier grimaant sous l'effort de la charge..., guerrier d'airain... dans l'attente manifeste de l'ennemi, porte-étendard serrant sa panoplie d'emblèmes incisifs, sur le cadavre d'un cheval, dans la tourmente du massacre... Le noir y retrouve une dignité... à l'aura martyre: mains nues (ou presque) contre la poudre' (Géricault, exh. cat., Paris, 1991, p. 236).
Brought back into the spotlight by Grunchec's publication and exhibition, Noir sur un cheval cabré still conceals its meaning and iconography, which remain uncertain. Clément was tempted to identify the present drawing as an episode of the Madagascan War although Grunchec's and Eitner's association of the Noir to Géricault's epic interpretation of the revolt of San Domingo is now more widely accepted (op. cit., 1982, p. 72). This stunning watercolour is thus a work of the imagination, executed by the artist from the fascinating stories related by his friend Colonel Bro, whose first mililitary campaign took place during the revolt of San Domingo. As Grunchec points out in the catalogue of the exhibition Master Drawings by Géricault (op. cit., p. 107), 'There exists in a private collection a watercolor inspired by the same source, inscribed by Géricault to his friend Colonel Bro: T. Gericault à son voisin Mr Bro' (fig. 2). Colonel Bro was one of the artist's closest friends, captured by Ary Scheffer in his Portrait de Géricault sur son lit de mort, 'affalé sur une chaise.. la tête sur son bras appuyé au dossier... l'ami qui se montra le plus fidèle' (G. Bazin, Géricault, Paris, vol. I, 1987, p. 209). Inspired by Bro's vivid recollections, Géricault portrayed his friend in a drawing which shares the Noir's boldly vigorous brushstroke, as well as the date - most certainly 1818-1819, as suggested by Grunchec: 'Nous proposerions volontiers d'adopter une datation intermédiaire, contemporaine de l'exécution des lithographies de 1818-1819 et de certains dessins à sujets militaires, stylistiquement et techniquement très voisins' (op. cit., 1982, p. 72).
In Noir sur un cheval cabré Géricault exploited the potential of a vibrant monochromatic, almost grisaille, palette loaded with chiaroscuro passages of great beauty. The subtle nuances of greys and blues are highlighted by the pezzo di bravura of the unusual rose colour of the rider's cap.
The watercolour is iconographically very important because of Géricault's portrayal of a black man and his elevation of the subject to an heroic level. Clément connected the Noir to Géricault's radical projects for the Traite des Noirs (1820-24). As the glorious warrior dominating Stanford's drawings (Porte-étendard noir, Stanford, University Art Museum, fig. 3), the noble protagonist of this watercolour is the formal pendant to the central figure of Géricault's masterpiece, the Radeau de la méduse (Paris, Louvre, fig. 1). In the Radeau de la méduse Géricault, regardless of historical facts, included three black men among the shipwrecked. He entrusted one of them with the role of giving the distress signal that embodied collective hope: everything in the Radeau is a reference to Africa, including the slave trade, and the painting is a few months ahead of the militant revival of abolitionism (see the section 'Le travail de l'idéologie', in Géricault. Conférences et colloques, Louvre, Paris, 1996, pp. 529-617).
His celebration of blackness is, as R. Michel observed, 'de nature héroïque, au contraire d'un Orient rêveur, qui se repaît de nostalgie. Héroïsme combatif: ses effigies de noirs sont des effigies belliqueuses, cavalier grimaant sous l'effort de la charge..., guerrier d'airain... dans l'attente manifeste de l'ennemi, porte-étendard serrant sa panoplie d'emblèmes incisifs, sur le cadavre d'un cheval, dans la tourmente du massacre... Le noir y retrouve une dignité... à l'aura martyre: mains nues (ou presque) contre la poudre' (Géricault, exh. cat., Paris, 1991, p. 236).