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Lot Essay
We are grateful to Virginia Budny, author of the forthcoming catalogue raisonné sponsored by the Lachaise Foundation, for her assistance in preparing the catalogue entry for this work.
Gaston Lachaise created Relief (Woman), a heroic low relief of a lightly draped nude, in homage to his beloved wife, Isabel Nagel. He developed the full-size model for the work over a nine-year period. The first version, recorded in photographs and a plaster fragment, was created in 1925. When Lachaise revisited the relief in August 1934, he wrote to Isabel: “I have begun to work again--almost finished the bas relief--the large one in plaster--It is definitely evolving into a fine work--tranquil and generous.” (as quoted in V. Budny, Gaston Lachaise: For the Love of Woman, exhibition catalogue, New York, 2016, p. 11) In the completed version, the woman is more majestic, her forms are more abundant, and her drapery is more voluminous. The resulting composition is much more expansive and impactful than the original, evoking a vision of the artist's wife as an embodiment of universal harmony and well-being.
The final plaster model was included in Lachaise’s retrospective exhibition in early 1935 at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Lachaise passed away shortly afterward in October of that year, and no bronze casts of Relief (Woman) were produced until decades later when the Lachaise Foundation issued a series of eight numbered casts on behalf of the artist's estate. Six of these were produced between about 1974 and 2012, including the present example as the third. The second, cast in 1993, is owned by the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri; the fourth, cast in 2003, belongs to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts; and the sixth, cast in 2012 and selectively gilded, is owned by the Lachaise Foundation, New York. The Lachaise Foundation also owns the plaster model of Relief (Woman) and has assigned the identification number LF 128 to the work.
Gaston Lachaise created Relief (Woman), a heroic low relief of a lightly draped nude, in homage to his beloved wife, Isabel Nagel. He developed the full-size model for the work over a nine-year period. The first version, recorded in photographs and a plaster fragment, was created in 1925. When Lachaise revisited the relief in August 1934, he wrote to Isabel: “I have begun to work again--almost finished the bas relief--the large one in plaster--It is definitely evolving into a fine work--tranquil and generous.” (as quoted in V. Budny, Gaston Lachaise: For the Love of Woman, exhibition catalogue, New York, 2016, p. 11) In the completed version, the woman is more majestic, her forms are more abundant, and her drapery is more voluminous. The resulting composition is much more expansive and impactful than the original, evoking a vision of the artist's wife as an embodiment of universal harmony and well-being.
The final plaster model was included in Lachaise’s retrospective exhibition in early 1935 at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Lachaise passed away shortly afterward in October of that year, and no bronze casts of Relief (Woman) were produced until decades later when the Lachaise Foundation issued a series of eight numbered casts on behalf of the artist's estate. Six of these were produced between about 1974 and 2012, including the present example as the third. The second, cast in 1993, is owned by the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri; the fourth, cast in 2003, belongs to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts; and the sixth, cast in 2012 and selectively gilded, is owned by the Lachaise Foundation, New York. The Lachaise Foundation also owns the plaster model of Relief (Woman) and has assigned the identification number LF 128 to the work.