Robert Lebel Collection for Paris Auction
Published December 9th, 2008
Sotheby’s Paris will stage its first-ever sale devoted exclusively to drawings, and will offer the prestigious Robert Lebel Collection of 170 drawings spanning the 16th–19th centuries, with an overall estimate of €1.1-1.6 million.
Robert Lebel (1901-86) was a highly independent and atypical figure, difficult if not impossible to classify. He was at the same time essayist, novelist, art historian, erudite collector, Marcel Duchamp’s first biographer, a friend of André Breton, and close to Max Ernst and Jacques Lacan. During his years in exile in New York during World War II, he assiduously frequented Breton, Matta, Ernst, Tanguy and the great ethnologist Claude Lévi-Strauss. Together they discovered Amerindian art, especially Eskimo art, then little-known. Back in France Robert Lebel worked as an expert in Old Master paintings for several prominent auctioneers, notably Maurice Rheims. His collection of Eskimo masks was sold at Drouot in 2006 under the gavel of Cyrille Cohen. Now his superb collection of Old Master drawings is to be offered at Sotheby’s.
The heart of the collection consists of Italian drawings, and includes several Renaissance masterpieces. The most eagerly awaited of these is likely to be a Study for the Madonna with the Long Neck by Francesco Mazzola, more commonly known as Parmigianino (1503-40). This is a preparatory drawing for the famous painting in Florence’s Uffizi Gallery (estimate €500,000-700,000). Parmigianino, who was influenced by both Corregio and Raphaël, was a born draughtsman whose works have always been especially popular in France. This Madonna Study, now appearing on the market for the first time, is unquestionably one of the finest versions and is sure to catch the eye of leading collectors from around the world.
Other rare works include a Figure Study by Raphaël’s assistant Perino del Vaga (est. €50,000/70,000); Pellegrino Tibaldi’s Project for a Frieze for the Castel Sant’Angelo (est. €50,000/70,000); and a design for the decoration of the Sala Paolina in the Vatican by the great Florentine artist Giorgio Vasari (est. €80,000/120,000). All these artists are united by the importance they attached to the art of drawing in their artistic creation.
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