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Property from the Collection of Professor and Mrs George Hamilton
While Professor George Heard Hamilton's first book, published in 1933, investigated the weighty field of medieval manuscripts, he devoted much of his scholarly writings to the art of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Especially his texts on Manet (Manet and his Critics, New Haven, 1954) and Russian art and architecture (The Art and Architecture of Russia, London, 1954) have been admired for their contribution to the body of historical knowledge and have been the cornerstone of scholarship in those fields of study for a generation of art historians and curators.
George Hamilton spent the first half of his career at Yale. He taught there from 1936 to 1966 and was appointed Professor of Art History in 1942. Hamilton joined the faculty at Williams College in 1966 where he implemented a graduate school program that trained many of the leading curators and art historians in the United States in the late twentieth century. Hamilton also directed the Sterling and Francine Clark Institute in Williamstown--which doubled in size under his leadership--and was a trustee of the Museum of Modern Art and chairman of its Painting and Sculpture Committee. In the 1970s he was Slade Professor at Cambridge and Kress Professor at the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.
Perhaps less known to the world of art historians, curators, students and museum directors was Professor and Mrs. Hamilton's dedication to Modernism and the art of their time. Together, they were fully assimilated into the world of contemporary art, and they forged intimate, lasting friendships with many of the artists whose works shaped the future of Post-War and Contemporary art. Among the Hamilton's circle were Marcel Duchamp and various members of the Matisse family, as well as Naum Gabo and Josef Albers. Together with Walter Bareiss, Hamilton founded The Readymade Press in the 1950s, which published numerous works on Duchamp, Albers and others, and operated in the printing offices of Yale University Press in a basement on York Street in New Haven.
Christie's is honored to be entrusted with the sale of The Collection of Professor and Mrs. George Heard Hamilton. Beyond being a brilliant leader in the museum world, he was a generous scholar and teacher, with an unerring eye and a sharp, critical intellect.
Property from the Collection of Professor and Mrs George Hamilton
Edgar Degas (1834-1917)
Tête, étude pour le portait de Mme. S. (Mathilde Salle)
Details
Edgar Degas (1834-1917)
Tête, étude pour le portait de Mme. S. (Mathilde Salle)
signed and numbered 'Degas 27/0' (on the left side); stamped with foundry mark 'A.A. HEBRARD CIRE PERDUE' (on the back)
bronze with dark brown patina
Height: 9½ in. (24.1 cm.)
Conceived in 1892; this bronze version cast at a later date in an edition of 22, numbered A to T plus two casts reserved for the Degas heirs and the founder Hébrard
Tête, étude pour le portait de Mme. S. (Mathilde Salle)
signed and numbered 'Degas 27/0' (on the left side); stamped with foundry mark 'A.A. HEBRARD CIRE PERDUE' (on the back)
bronze with dark brown patina
Height: 9½ in. (24.1 cm.)
Conceived in 1892; this bronze version cast at a later date in an edition of 22, numbered A to T plus two casts reserved for the Degas heirs and the founder Hébrard
Provenance
Galerie Alfred Flechtheim, Berlin.
Curt Valentin Gallery, New York.
Acquired from the above by the late owners, 1954.
Curt Valentin Gallery, New York.
Acquired from the above by the late owners, 1954.
Literature
J. Rewald, Degas, Works in Sculpture, A Complete Catalogue, New York, 1944, p. 23, no. XXX (another cast illustrated, p. 83).
J. Rewald and L. von Matt, L'oeuvre Sculpté de Degas, Zurich, 1957, p. 149, no. XXX (another cast illustrated, fig. 10).
F. Russoli, L'Opera completa di Degas, Milan, 1970, p. 145, no. S70 (another cast illustrated).
C.W. Millard, The Sculpture of Edgar Degas, Princeton, 1976 (clay version illustrated, pl. 117).
J. Rewald, Degas's Complete Sculpture, Catalogue Raisonné, San Francisco, 1990, p. 98, no. XXX (another cast illustrated).
S. Campbell, "Degas, The Sculptures, A Catalogue Raisonné," Apollo, August 1995, vol. CXLII, p. 24, no. 27 (another cast illustrated).
J.S. Czestochowski and A. Pingeot, Degas Sculptures, Catalogue Raisonné of the Bronzes, Memphis, 2002, p. 175, no. 27 (another cast illustrated in color, p. 174).
J. Rewald and L. von Matt, L'oeuvre Sculpté de Degas, Zurich, 1957, p. 149, no. XXX (another cast illustrated, fig. 10).
F. Russoli, L'Opera completa di Degas, Milan, 1970, p. 145, no. S70 (another cast illustrated).
C.W. Millard, The Sculpture of Edgar Degas, Princeton, 1976 (clay version illustrated, pl. 117).
J. Rewald, Degas's Complete Sculpture, Catalogue Raisonné, San Francisco, 1990, p. 98, no. XXX (another cast illustrated).
S. Campbell, "Degas, The Sculptures, A Catalogue Raisonné," Apollo, August 1995, vol. CXLII, p. 24, no. 27 (another cast illustrated).
J.S. Czestochowski and A. Pingeot, Degas Sculptures, Catalogue Raisonné of the Bronzes, Memphis, 2002, p. 175, no. 27 (another cast illustrated in color, p. 174).
Brought to you by
David Kleiweg de Zwaan