Chiparus & the Ballets Russes: Twelve Masterworks from an Important Private Collection

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Lot 9
  • 9

Demeter Chiparus

Estimate
350,000 - 500,000 USD
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Description

  • Demeter Chiparus
  • Semiramis

  • base engraved Chiparus, figure stamped 11

  • cold-painted, parcel-gilt and silvered bronze; carved and tinted ivory; on an onyx base
  • 26 1/2 x 19 3/8 x 5 in. (67.3 x 49.2 x 12.7 cm)

Provenance

Andrée Vyncke, Paris, 1990 (for the figure)
Private Midwestern Collection (for the base)
Christie's New York, June 11, 1994, lot 35 (for the base)

Literature

Bryan Catley, Art Deco and other Figures, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1978, p. 98
Alastair Duncan, ed., The Encyclopedia of Art Deco, New York, 1988, p. 27
Alberto Shayo, Chiparus:  Master of Art Deco, New York, 1993, p. 51 (for the plasteline model) and pp. 8 and 118, pl. 50 

Catalogue Note

The legendary Babylonian queen Semiramis was another of the early twentieth-century's gallery of lustful theatrical heroines.  Though Voltaire and Rossini had created works around her myth in centuries past, Chiparus recreates her as a vamp from the silent cinema—another theatrical medium with links to the sculptor's work.