KOROVIN, KONSTANTIN (1861–1939) Lot n° 38

Le Port de Nice, signé et daté 1922. Huile sur toile, 60,5 par 81 cm. Provenance : Collection de l'artiste. Acquis directement auprès de ce qui précède par le père d'un précédent propriétaire. Importante collection privée, Europe. Exposée : Les artistes russes hors frontiere, Musée du Montparnasse, Paris, 21 July–31 October 2010. La Russie inconnue, Salle d'exposition du Quai Antoine Ier, Monaco, 25 June–27 August 2015. Literature: Exhibition catalogue, A. Hofmann, V. Hofmann, G. Khatsenkov, Les artistes russes hors frontière, Paris, Edition Paradox, 2010, p. 52, illustrated. X. Muratova, Neizvestnaia Rossiia. Russkoe iskusstvo pervoi poloviny XX veka, Milan, Silvana Editoriale, 2015, p. 189, No. 155, illustrated. Le Port de Nice, offered here for auction, is a unique testament to artistic freedom, experienced by Konstantin Korovin upon leaving the Soviet Union in 1922. Art critics said that the works created in the first few years of his immigration could not be “described”; they had to be seen, in as much as no verbal account could adequately recreate the formidable avalanche of colour that dominated them. In November 1922, the artist suddenly left Soviet Russia and set off for France, following the footsteps of his friend, the famous bassist - Feodor Chaliapin. Korovin initially meant to return after the medical treatment of his son was finished and his exhibition ended. Yet this never happened, and the Korovins first settled in Paris, and then relocated to Nice. Finding himself now in the south of France after the miserable and harsh post-revolutionary years that he had spent far from city life in the Tver region, with its northern, changeable climate, the artist truly revelled in the bright southern sun. He paints from life once again, going out for walks along the coast day after day with his easel.