Le cerf-volant

Details

Berthe Morisot (1841-1895)
Le cerf-volant
stamped with initials 'B.M.' (Lugt 388a; lower right), and titled 'Le cerf volant' (lower left)
watercolor over pencil on paper laid down on paper
Image size: 10½ x 7½ in. (26.9 x 19.3 cm.)
Sheet size: 14½ x 11 7/8 in. (37 x 32 cm.)

Provenance

Galerie L. Dru, Paris.

Literature

M.-L. Bataille and G. Wildenstein, Berthe Morisot, Paris, 1961, p. 69, no. 777.

Exhibited

Paris, Galerie Durand-Ruel, Berthe Morisot. Exposition de son oeuvre, March 1896, no. 311.
Paris, Galerie L. Dru, July 1918.
Paris, Galerie Bernheim-Jeune, Cent oeuvres de Berthe Morisot, November 1919, no. 94.
Paris, Galerie L. Dru, Exposition Rétrospective Berthe Morisot, June-July 1922.
Paris, Galerie L. Dru, Exposition de Pastels, Aquarelles, Dessins, Crayons de Berthe Morisot, May-June 1926, p. 13, no. 70 (dated 1889).

Sale room notice

Please note the medium is watercolor and thinned oil over pencil on paper laid down on paper.

Lot Essay

According to Bataille and Wildenstein (op. cit.), the child depicted here is Jeanne Bonnet, a friend of Morisot's family. A redheaded girl, she was around the same age as Morisot's daughter Julie Manet, who was then about eleven years old. Here she is engaged in retrieving a shuttlecock that has gone astray in a game of badminton. Morisot used Jeanne as a model in several other pictures related to badminton: a portrait in oils in which she holds a racket and shuttlecocks, Le volant (1888; Bataille and Wildenstein, no. 220), and two related pastel studies (nos. 530 and 531). Bataille and Wildenstein note the existence of two uncatalogued drawings related to the present work. Jeanne also appears in the oil painting La lecture (1888; Bataille and Wildenstein, no. 219; coll. Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg, Florida) and a related pastel study (no. 528).

More from Impressionist and Modern Art (Day Sale) and Impressionist

View All