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Lot Essay
In the early stages of his career, from 1910 to 1914, Modigliani aspired to be a sculptor. He focused on a narrow range of themes: idol-like heads, one kneeling caryatid and a single standing figure, totaling about two dozen works. He produced numerous watercolors and drawings that attest to the intensity of Modigliani's preoccupation with sculptural form during this period, and his studies of caryatids are among his most formally adventurous works in any medium.
To reinforce the classical element inherent in this archaic subject, Modigliani honed and reduced his forms to their utmost simplicity. The violent, primitive expression found in Picasso's early cubist works, which also draws heavily upon archaic and tribal sources, is absent in Modigliani's treatment of the caryatid theme. He was more concerned with formal balance and repose, in which each contour was firmly rendered and set in counterpoint to adjacent lines, creating a fugue-like composition of repeated and inverted forms. His use of ovoid shapes lent the composition a sense of sculptural volume, contrasted with the flatness of the drawn line and the application of monochrome paint. The overall effect is that of a monumental structure unified by its linear rhythms and the careful balance of its proportions.
Modigliani was one of the first artists working in Paris in the early years of the Twentieth Century to embrace the influence of so-called "tribal" art. He had been exposed to native arts through several of his friends and acquaintances in Montparnasse, not least Joseph Brummer, a Hungarian art dealer who was the artist's neighbor in the Cité Falguière where he was a resident. Modigliani's use of ancient and exotic precedents during this time would influence the nudes and portraits that he would create from 1914 onwards, when he abandoned sculpture and returned to painting. He channeled their energy and their direct means of expression into his own highly modern works such as the present lot, which highlights the curvaceous female body of this figure. With her closed mouth and empty stare, Cariatide is in part a timeless evocation of feminine beauty mixed with a serene mask-like angular face.
To reinforce the classical element inherent in this archaic subject, Modigliani honed and reduced his forms to their utmost simplicity. The violent, primitive expression found in Picasso's early cubist works, which also draws heavily upon archaic and tribal sources, is absent in Modigliani's treatment of the caryatid theme. He was more concerned with formal balance and repose, in which each contour was firmly rendered and set in counterpoint to adjacent lines, creating a fugue-like composition of repeated and inverted forms. His use of ovoid shapes lent the composition a sense of sculptural volume, contrasted with the flatness of the drawn line and the application of monochrome paint. The overall effect is that of a monumental structure unified by its linear rhythms and the careful balance of its proportions.
Modigliani was one of the first artists working in Paris in the early years of the Twentieth Century to embrace the influence of so-called "tribal" art. He had been exposed to native arts through several of his friends and acquaintances in Montparnasse, not least Joseph Brummer, a Hungarian art dealer who was the artist's neighbor in the Cité Falguière where he was a resident. Modigliani's use of ancient and exotic precedents during this time would influence the nudes and portraits that he would create from 1914 onwards, when he abandoned sculpture and returned to painting. He channeled their energy and their direct means of expression into his own highly modern works such as the present lot, which highlights the curvaceous female body of this figure. With her closed mouth and empty stare, Cariatide is in part a timeless evocation of feminine beauty mixed with a serene mask-like angular face.