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Lot Essay
Michelina endormie fait partie des plus beaux dessins de grand format créés par le comte Balthasar Klossowski de Rola, artiste reclus plus connu sous le nom de Balthus. Achevée en 1975, cette grande feuille témoigne de la créativité qui continuait à l'animer à un âge avancé. En 1961, Balthus est nommé directeur de la Villa Médicis par André Malraux, il y dirige les résidences d'artistes jusqu'en 1977. La majeure partie du travail de Balthus au cours des années 1970 représente Michelina et sa soeur Katia, les filles d'un employé de la Villa Médicis. Il existe peu de tableaux de cette époque, car Balthus s'était lancé dans la restauration de la villa pour lui faire retrouver sa simplicité d'origine. Cependant ses dessins de l'époque illustrent son intérêt pérenne pour les portraits de jeunes femmes alanguies et rêveuses, thème qui lui valut l'intérêt du public à partir des années 1930.
Jeune homme, Balthus fréquente le milieu intellectuel et artistique où se côtoient Pablo Picasso, Piet Mondrian, Alberto Giacometti, Antonin Artaud et Jean Cocteau. Cependant, malgré sa place en première ligne de l'avant-garde parisienne, Balthus se refuse à toute forme d'abstraction ou de stylisation manifeste dans son art. Il est un peintre entièrement figuratif, cherchant une esthétique d'harmonie idéale, dans l'esprit des tableaux historiques qu'il connait depuis les visites de son enfance au Louvre.
Comme dans beaucoup de ses tableaux antérieurs, il émane de Michelina endormie une atmosphère rêveuse et ouvertement sensuelle. Le modèle abîmé dans le sommeil semble parfaitement inconscient. Elle ignore probablement l'autre présence dans la pièce, alors que Balthus installe le spectateur en voyeur de son monde privé. Cette image appelle le commentaire d'Albert Camus sur l'art de Balthus : "la réalité la plus ordinaire peut prendre une dimension lointaine et peu familière, la résonance douce, le mystère assourdi d'un paradis perdu" (cité in S. Klossowski de Rola, Balthus, Londres, 1983, couverture intérieure).
Michelina endormie is among the finest large-scale drawings to be created by the reclusive Count Balthasar Klossowski de Rola, better known to the world as Balthus. Completed in 1975, this vast sheet is a testament to the creativity that continued to flourish even in his later years.
In 1961 Balthus was named Director of the Villa Medici by andré Malraux, where he led the artist's residence until 1977. The bulk of Balthus's work from the 1970s represent Michelina and her sister Katia, who were daughters of an employee at the Villa Medici. Very few paintings from this period exist, for Balthus had thrown himself into the restoration of the villa to its original simplicity. However his drawings from this time indulge in his enduring interest in portraying languid and dreaming young women, a theme that first gained him public attention in the 1930s.
As a young man Balthus had mingled in an intellectual and artistic milieu that included the likes of Pablo Picasso, Piet Mondrian, Alberto Giacometti, Antonin Artaud and Jean Cocteau. Yet despite his placement at the forefront of the Parisian avant-garde, Balthus had opposed all forms of abstraction or overt stylization in his art. He was entirely a figurative painter who sought an aesthetic of ideal harmony like the historical paintings he knew from his childhood excursions to the Louvre.
Like many early precedents, Balthus's Michelina endormie is an image of fantasy and unfettered sensuality. The model is shrouded in sleep and is therefore spirited away from any conscious expression. She is presumably unaware of any other presence in the room, with Balthus positioning the viewer as a voyeur into her private world. It is an image that recalls Albert Camus' comment on Balthus's art where, 'the most ordinary reality can assume an unfamiliar remote air, the soft resonance, the muffled mystery of a lost paradise' (A. Camus, quoted in S. Klossowski de Rola, Balthus, London, 1983, inside cover).
Jeune homme, Balthus fréquente le milieu intellectuel et artistique où se côtoient Pablo Picasso, Piet Mondrian, Alberto Giacometti, Antonin Artaud et Jean Cocteau. Cependant, malgré sa place en première ligne de l'avant-garde parisienne, Balthus se refuse à toute forme d'abstraction ou de stylisation manifeste dans son art. Il est un peintre entièrement figuratif, cherchant une esthétique d'harmonie idéale, dans l'esprit des tableaux historiques qu'il connait depuis les visites de son enfance au Louvre.
Comme dans beaucoup de ses tableaux antérieurs, il émane de Michelina endormie une atmosphère rêveuse et ouvertement sensuelle. Le modèle abîmé dans le sommeil semble parfaitement inconscient. Elle ignore probablement l'autre présence dans la pièce, alors que Balthus installe le spectateur en voyeur de son monde privé. Cette image appelle le commentaire d'Albert Camus sur l'art de Balthus : "la réalité la plus ordinaire peut prendre une dimension lointaine et peu familière, la résonance douce, le mystère assourdi d'un paradis perdu" (cité in S. Klossowski de Rola, Balthus, Londres, 1983, couverture intérieure).
Michelina endormie is among the finest large-scale drawings to be created by the reclusive Count Balthasar Klossowski de Rola, better known to the world as Balthus. Completed in 1975, this vast sheet is a testament to the creativity that continued to flourish even in his later years.
In 1961 Balthus was named Director of the Villa Medici by andré Malraux, where he led the artist's residence until 1977. The bulk of Balthus's work from the 1970s represent Michelina and her sister Katia, who were daughters of an employee at the Villa Medici. Very few paintings from this period exist, for Balthus had thrown himself into the restoration of the villa to its original simplicity. However his drawings from this time indulge in his enduring interest in portraying languid and dreaming young women, a theme that first gained him public attention in the 1930s.
As a young man Balthus had mingled in an intellectual and artistic milieu that included the likes of Pablo Picasso, Piet Mondrian, Alberto Giacometti, Antonin Artaud and Jean Cocteau. Yet despite his placement at the forefront of the Parisian avant-garde, Balthus had opposed all forms of abstraction or overt stylization in his art. He was entirely a figurative painter who sought an aesthetic of ideal harmony like the historical paintings he knew from his childhood excursions to the Louvre.
Like many early precedents, Balthus's Michelina endormie is an image of fantasy and unfettered sensuality. The model is shrouded in sleep and is therefore spirited away from any conscious expression. She is presumably unaware of any other presence in the room, with Balthus positioning the viewer as a voyeur into her private world. It is an image that recalls Albert Camus' comment on Balthus's art where, 'the most ordinary reality can assume an unfamiliar remote air, the soft resonance, the muffled mystery of a lost paradise' (A. Camus, quoted in S. Klossowski de Rola, Balthus, London, 1983, inside cover).