Marie Mela MUTER (Franco-Polish, 1876-1967) Still... Lot 40

Marie Mela MUTER (Franco-Polish, 1876-1967) Still life in Izvestia, 1918. Canvas. H. 75, W. 81 cm. Provenance: former collection of his Excellency the French Ambassador Eirik Labonne (1888-1967), sent on a mission to Russia from 1917 to 1919, then from 1925 to 1928 and finally in 1940. Bibliography: "Mela Muter, Malarstwo Peinture", catalogue works of the University Museum in Torun, 2010, to be compared with a still life with melons and grapes, p. 35. JOINT: a handwritten letter from Mela Mutter to Eirik Labonne: "I forgot to remind you of the Izvestia number you promised me in the still life. I would be very grateful if you would send it to me as soon as possible. I look forward to making this painting and sending it to you. Can I count on that? "She adds: "I have seen the silhouette again in watercolor and find it better than I thought. I would be very happy to finish it a little and send it to you with the other painting. Franco-Polish painter Mela Muter was born in Warsaw in 1876. She moved to Paris in 1901 where she remained until her death in 1967. Wife of a socialist journalist, she attended various academies of painting. At the Grande Chaumière where Jules Pascin, Camille Claudel, Estève and Eileen Gray were students for a time, she perfected her art until the Chéron gallery hired her. Various exhibitions follow at the Salon d'automne, in Barcelona, Germany or the United States. Among her friends are Kees van Dongen, with whom she exhibits, and various personalities of the time such as Clemenceau, Ravel, Satie and the young poet Rilke, whose portraits she draws. Her women with children and still lifes with fruit bursting with light are particularly appreciated. The one we are presenting evokes Cézanne and Fauvism. The painter inscribes her composition between two countries, Parisian modernity and Russia discreetly present through the Cyrillic characters of a newspaper. The banality of this table is transcended by apples that become solar stars. Rainer M