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F O R I M M E D I A T E R E L E A S E

100 YEARS OF MODERN ART AT CHRISTIE’S

IMPRESSIONIST AND MODERN ART SALES IN NEW YORK

HIGHLIGHTS INCLUDE WORKS BY PICASSO, GIACOMETTI AND KANDINSKY

WORKS FROM THE RENOWNED COLLECTION OF JAN KRUGIER KICK OFF A WEEK OF SALES

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)

Le peintre et son modèle dans un paysage

oil on canvas, Painted on 15 June-19 September 1963

Estimate: $25,000,000-35,000,000 New York - Christie’s is pleased to present a series of sales featuring the most important artists of the late 19th and 20th

Centuries, starting with A Dialogue Through Art: Works from The Jan Krugier Collection, a two-part auction on

November 4 and 5, and followed by the Evening Sale of Impressionist and Modern Art on November 5 and the Day and

Works on Paper Sales on November 6. Encompassing the very best of Modern art, these sales feature major, fresh to

the market pieces by Picasso, Giacometti, Modigliani, Kandinsky, Miró, Moore, Magritte and Gris, among others. This

series of auctions will offer more than 490 works of art estimated to achieve more than $390 million.

Brooke Lampley, Head of Department, Impressionist & Modern Art, comments, “Christie’s November sales feature the

undisputed heavyweight artists of the Twentieth Century and affirm their pivotal place in art history. From Picasso’s

small talismanic “Cigare,” an evocative found object, to his masterful ode to the sensuous, physical act of painting, “Le

peintre et son modèle dans un paysage,” from Moore’s daringly abstract modeling of the human figure in his

monumental “Reclining Figure” to Giacometti’s scintillating recalibration of the art of portraiture in his “Diego en

chemise écossaise,” this season’s Impressionist and Modern sale showcases decisive moments of innovation in modern

art.”

Andreas Rumbler, Deputy Chairman and Acting Head of Department,

Impressionist & Modern Art, adds, “Christie’s is delighted to offer

Impressionist and Modern master works spanning from 1876 to 1976,

thereby offering viewers the opportunity to follow the development of

modern art ranging from high quality Impressionist works by Monet

and Signac up to a magnificent portrait of Diego Giacometti, an

epitome of portraiture of the modern man in the post-war era.”

Leading the Evening Sale on 5 November is Alberto Giacometti’s

(1901-1966) singular Diego en chemise écossaise, among the most

compelling renderings Alberto ever produced of his brother Diego, his

signature subject (pictured right; estimated at $30—50 million). A

masterpiece of modern portraiture, Diego en chemise écossaise

showcases the graphic drama and economy of representation that

would become hallmarks of Giacometti’s painting. This work has been

in a private collection for over two decades and has never appeared at

auction. To learn more, please refer to the complete press release.

Also among the top lots in the Evening Sale is a seminal work of Pablo Picasso’s (1881-1973) late period, Le peintre et

son modèle dans un paysage, painted on 15 June-19 September 1963, which has been in a private American collection

for more than 20 years (pictured page 1; estimate: $25-35 million). From

1963-1965, Picasso undertook the theme of the artist and model and this

work is among the largest format utilized. This subject preoccupied the

artist at the conclusion of a decade during which he often sought

inspiration in the iconography of the great masters, chief among them

Delacroix, Velázquez, Manet and Poussin. He worked on this particular

canvas over a period of three months, something rare in his late-1960s

paintings. With a sumptuously loaded brush, Picasso takes his mise-en-

scène out of the studio and into the fields. The composition is bisected by

the artist’s canvas in the center, the artist and model on either side,

serving as a compelling allegory for art as an act of self-portraiture.

Picasso’s Femme au béret orange et au col de fourrure (Marie-Thérèse) is

among the highlights of the artist’s work in the Evening Sale (pictured left;

estimate: $8-12 million). This colorful portrait depicts one of the artist’s

most famous mistresses, Marie-Thérèse Walter, adorned in a stylishly

cosmopolitan fur-trimmed dress and sporting a jaunty orange plaid beret. Marie-Thérèse and Picasso had met nearly

eleven years earlier and, by the time this work was executed, she had given birth to

their child and become an ever-present muse in the artist’s oeuvre.

Amedeo Modigliani’s (1884-1920) 1918 portrait of a fellow Montparnasse artist,

Monsieur Baranowski, represents the consummate realization of the signature style

that Modigliani developed after 1916 (pictured right; estimate: $25-35 million). The

Polish painter’s face is oval and elongated, with impenetrable almond-shaped eyes

and sensuous pursed lips; the neck is graceful and swan-like, the fingers long and

tapered, and his body assumes a complex, serpentine pose. Modigliani developed

his own distinctive pictorial idiom from a host of disparate sources: the sinuous

contours and elongated proportions of Italian Mannerist painting, the exquisite

linear stylizations of African and Oceanic masks, the abstract refinement of

sculpture by his friend Constantin Brancusi, and the incisive firmness of line that

comes from Modigliani’s own stone carvings. The resulting portrait is

simultaneously a sensitive, individualized characterization of Baranowski and an

archetype of Modigliani’s unique conception of beauty.

Another highlight of the sale is Guitare sur une

table by Juan Gris (1887-1927) painted in January 1916 (pictured left; estimate:

$10-15 million). Cubist masterpieces are relatively rare to the market and great

examples by Juan Gris have paved the way for new record prices in recent years. In

this work, Gris deftly demonstrates that he is the strongest colorist among the

Cubists by utilizing a brilliant chroma of angled translucent color planes, stacked

one atop another like panes of tinted glass.

Wassily Kandinsky’s (1866-1944) Schwarz und Violett (“Black and Violet”) was

painted in April 1923, during the influential period while the artist was Teaching

Master at the Weimar Bauhaus (pictured below; estimate: $4,500,000-7,500,000).

The work is from his

series of geometrically-

driven paintings that the

artist executed in the first half of 1923, all of whose titles are

derived from their dominant colors, rather than phrases

evoking a sensation or state of mind. The painting employs

the constructivist manner of contemporary Russian painting,

depicting two sail boats moving across calm waters, away

from the ominous black cloud, which has already overtaken

the third sail boat with a flag bearing the colors of the

former Tsarist regime. These elements suggest a pictorial

parable recounting the departure of Kandinsky and his wife

from revolutionary Russia. Before Kandinsky’s Bauhaus

period, the abstract forms of triangles, diagonals and circles of Schwarz und Violett are foreshadowed in the

mountainside landscape of Herbstlandschaft, executed in 1911, a highlight featured in the Jan Krugier Collection on

November 4 (estimate: $20-25 million).

The Surrealist highlight of the auction is Le domaine

enchanté (II), which served as a model for René

Magritte’s (1898-1967) 1953 commission by Gustave

Nellens (pictured right; estimate: $6,000,000-8,000,000).

Commissioned by the owner of the seaside Casino

Communal at Knokke-Le-Zoute in Belgian Flanders,

Magritte created a large-scale mural for one of the

gaming rooms, the Salle de Lustre. The present work

depicts a statuesque woman holding two forms of the

same bird – an egg in one hand and a full-fledged creature in the other. The completed mural at Knokke serves as a

permanent attraction and destination to this day, having recast the casino hall over the years as an important surrealist

environment.

Henry Moore’s (1898-1986) bronze Reclining Figure, created in 1969-1970, measures over 11 feet, and is

length-wise the largest single-piece sculpture on this theme that the artist ever created (pictured left).

Estimated at $6-8 million, the sculpture is being sold by a Distinguished

Collection, where it has resided for 35 years. Reclining Figure will be

prominently displayed outside at Christie's plaza in

Rockefeller Center in the weeks leading up to the sale. To

learn more about this work, please read the complete press

release.

Notes to Editors: Christie’s previously announced the following highlights with dedicated press releases: A Dialogue Through Art: Works from The Jan Krugier Collection Alberto Giacometti’s, Diego en chemise écossaise Henry Moore’s, Reclining Figure

PRESS CONTACT: Sara Fox | +1 212 636 2680 | sfox@christies.com

Please click here for the complete eCatalogue for the Evening Sale. Please click here for the eCatalogue of A Dialogue Through Art: Works from the Jan Krugier Collection.

About Christie’s Christie’s, the world's leading art business, reached a total of £2.4 billion/$3.68 billion in global auction and private sales in the first six months of 2013. In 2012, global auction and private sales totaled £3.92 billion/$6.27 billion, marking the highest annual revenue ever reached by Christie’s. Christie’s is a name and place that speaks of extraordinary art, unparalleled service and expertise, as

well as international glamour. Founded in 1766 by James Christie, Christie's has since conducted the greatest and most celebrated auctions through the centuries providing a popular showcase for the unique and the beautiful. Christie’s offers over 450 auct ions annually in over 80 categories, including all areas of fine and decorative arts, jewelry, photography, collectibles, wine, and more. Prices range from $200 to over $100 million. Christie's also has a long and successful history conducting private sales for its clients in all categories, with an emphasis on Post-War and Contemporary, Impressionist and Modern, Old Masters and Jewelry. Global private sales totaled £465 million/$711 million in the first half year of 2013, an increase of 13% from the same period last year, breaking the sales record of half year private sales for Christie’s and the art market for three consecutive years. Christie’s has a global presence of 53 offices in 32 countries and 11 salerooms around the world including London, New York, Paris, Geneva, Milan, Amsterdam, Dubai, Zürich, Hong Kong, and Shanghai. Christie’s has recently led in growth markets such as Russia, China, India and The United Arab Emirates, with successful sales, exhibitions and initiatives held in Beijing, Mumbai and Dubai.

*Estimates do not include buyer’s premium. Sales totals are hammer price plus buyer’s premium and do not reflect costs, financing

fees or application of buyer’s or seller’s credits.

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Images available on request

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