Beloosesky Gallery is interested in purchasing artworks created by Marie Laurencin.
Please call (917) 749-4557 or email us at info@beloosesky.com
Marie Laurencin, intimate of Braque, Picasso, Matisse and Appollinaire, was born in 1883. She held a celebrated place in the early part of the 20th century during a period when Art exploded with genius. She lived in the Montmartre District of Paris and became part of the circle revolving around the Steins. Though her early portraits show the imprint of the Fauves and Cubists, her romantic and delicate temperament asserted itself against these schools. She was best known for her Cubist paintings and sculpture. Working primarily in a palette of muted tones in grey, pink, and pastels, Laurencin’s delicate portraits focused on those of young women and animals.
Marie Laurencin was prim, conservative and always wore a kitchen apron when she painted. She had a celebrated love affair with Guilliame Appollinaire, great French modern critic, but was never able to marry him because of demands of her domineering mother. Called the 'muse' by her fellow painters, her works are loved for their fragile beauty. Though they may be feminine in subject and execution, the distortion of form and the simplicity of expression mark her for a Modern Master.
Girls, pretty girls, were the subject of practically all Laurencin's oils. Marie Laurencin painted girls in all kinds of poses and all had her personal mark, smooth young faces, pale skin and dark eyes. Her early work was not easily accepted; it showed the influence of Toulouse-Lautrec and of cubism.
In 1907, she exhibited at the Salon des Indépendants. After a series of shows, including an exhibition alongside Robert Delaunay at the Galerie Barbazanges in Paris, Laurencin participated in the New York Armory Show in 1913.
World War I took her out of the Paris circle for a while; she married a German painter, Otto von Waetjen, and they were forced to leave France. They lived in Spain, then she got a divorce and returned to Paris. After moving back to Paris she began developing her own style, focusing on figural and portrait work in delicate pastels and airy shading. The 1920s proved to be an important period for Laurencin, as her refined style and palette heightened her popularity as a portraitist among the elite.
In her later years, she became almost a hermit, although mothers with daughters in tow still came to her. Marie Laurencin died in 1956.
In 1983, on the 100th anniversary of her birthday, the Musée Marie Laurencin opened in Nagano, Japan.
Biography partially from the Archives of AskART
PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
Art Institute of Chicago
Museum of Modern Art, New York City
Harvard University Art Museums, Massachusetts
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C.
Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indiana
Lille Metropole Musee d'Art Moderne, France
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, St. Louis, Missouri