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Lot Essay
In the last fifteen years of his life, Léger concentrated his artistic effort on large compositions, built up from cycles of works in which the same motif or form was employed in different contexts. The present work is one such variation from the cycle of La Grande Parade, the final version of which is in the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York.
The present painting is exemplary of how Léger explored and played with the various elements from his cast of Grande Parade characters, here concentrating on the banjo player, acrobat and horse. He admitted "I study everything ponderously. I work very slowly indeed. I am unable to improvise. The more I watch myself, the more I see that I am a classic. I do a long preparatory work. First I do a quantity of drawings, then I do gouaches and lastly I pass on to canvas".
In another context he remarked "If I have drawn circus people, acrobats, clowns, jugglers, it is because I have taken an interest in their work for thirty years...I did a quantity of drawings and studies for a Grande Parade...The slightest transformation was long pondered and worked up with the help of new drawings. A local alteration often involved changing the entire composition because it affected the balance of the whole" (see W. Schmalenbach, Fernand Léger, New York 1976, p. 166).
The exuberance of the characters in the present painting is emphasized by Léger's confident use of bold form and colour, encircling his rhythmic forms in clear black outlines and infusing the whole canvas with energy and movement.
The present painting is exemplary of how Léger explored and played with the various elements from his cast of Grande Parade characters, here concentrating on the banjo player, acrobat and horse. He admitted "I study everything ponderously. I work very slowly indeed. I am unable to improvise. The more I watch myself, the more I see that I am a classic. I do a long preparatory work. First I do a quantity of drawings, then I do gouaches and lastly I pass on to canvas".
In another context he remarked "If I have drawn circus people, acrobats, clowns, jugglers, it is because I have taken an interest in their work for thirty years...I did a quantity of drawings and studies for a Grande Parade...The slightest transformation was long pondered and worked up with the help of new drawings. A local alteration often involved changing the entire composition because it affected the balance of the whole" (see W. Schmalenbach, Fernand Léger, New York 1976, p. 166).
The exuberance of the characters in the present painting is emphasized by Léger's confident use of bold form and colour, encircling his rhythmic forms in clear black outlines and infusing the whole canvas with energy and movement.