Jean Pougny

Private Collection, Leningrad

Mr and Mrs George Costakis, Moscow (sold: Sotheby Parke Bernet, London, June 30, 1981, lot 69)

Waddington Galleries, London (acquired at the above sale)

Acquired from the above by the present owner

Zurich, Kunsthaus Zurich, Rétrospective Pougny,  1960, no. 2, illustrated in the catalogue

Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum, Rétrospective Pougny, 1961, no. 10a

Paris, Galerie Charpentier, Rétrospective Pougny, 1961-62, no. 11, illustrated in the catalogue

Turin, Galleria civica d’arte moderna, Rétrospective Pougny, 1962-63, illustrated in the catalogue

Düsseldorf, Kunstmuseum Düsseldorf, Werke aus der Sammlung Costakis: Russische Avantgarde 1910-1930, 1977, no. 142

Paris, Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Jean Pougny, 1993, no. 33, illustrated in color in the catalogue

Herman Berninger & Jean-Albert Cartier, Pougny, Catalogue de l’oeuvre, vol. 1, Tubingen, 1972 no. 49, illustrated in color p. 93 (reference to Mme Puni archive, no. 324a)

A. Zander Rudenstein (ed.), Collecting Art of the Avant-Garde by George Costakis, New York, 1981, no. 992, illustrated p. 437

Very good condition. The canvas has been lined using Beva-371 as an adhesive. Under UV, there are a few small retouches in the red shape in the lower center and in one spot in the lower left. There is a mark suggesting that while the work was still wet the green triangle in the lower left quadrant was pushed slightly by a sharp object, which required some small retouches.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

A key figure of the Russian avant-garde, Jean Pougny (Ivan Puni) was among the first Russian artists to experiment with Cubism and Fauvism, thanks to his early travels to France. On his first visit to Paris from 1909-1912 he enrolled at the esteemed Académie Julien, and it was during this period while living with Yuri Annenkov that he found himself captivated by the art of the Cubists.

Upon his return to Russia Pougny quickly adopted the revolutionary attitudes and aesthetics of the times and joined the Union of Youth; he tentatively embraced the tenets of Cubo-Futurism, a popular and uniquely Russian amalgamation of Cubism and Futurism, and he allied himself closely with Kazimir Malevich. Breaking with the Union of Youth in 1914, Pougny participated in the Salon des Indépendants and organized a number of vanguard exhibitions including Tramvai V and the groundbreaking 0.10, where Malevich first introduced his abstract Suprematist paintings. Though Pougny was one of the earliest proponents of Malevich’s new style and revealed a number of his own abstract compositions at this exhibition, he did not slavishly strive to copy Malevich’s methods, instead focusing on illusionistic collage reliefs, more materially akin to the work of Vladimir Tatlin.

In the later 1910s Pougny produced a variety of essays and artwork based on revolutionary themes, and he accepted an invitation from Marc Chagall to teach at Vitebsk Art School before emigrating to Finland, Germany and ultimately back to France. At the same time he returned to figural imagery with an important series of Cubist-inspired still life paintings. Chaise et boite à chapeaux exemplifies this series, where hat boxes figure prominently, though perhaps most significant in this composition is the presence of a folded copy of the newspaper Le Journal—not only alluding to the fractured words and images that commonly appeared in Russian avant-garde painting, but also alluding to the earlier still life compositions of Pablo Picasso, who famously included fragments of Le Journal in several paintings and collages, never revealing its entire title.

Chaise et boite à chapeaux was in the celebrated collection of Mr and Mrs George Costakis when it was first published in Herman Berninger’s Pougny catalogue raisonné in 1973. George Costakis, who worked for the Greek and Canadian embassies in Moscow, was an avid art enthusiast and, over the course of several decades, he amassed the world’s most important grouping of Russian avant-garde art. The Costakis’ apartment became a central meeting place for artists and art collectors alike. When the couple chose to emigrate in 1977, they agreed to leave half their collection behind to the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow, thereby helping to reinvigorate interest in this crucial and revolutionary period of art history.