Gaston Lachaise

Mr. and Mrs. Stanley B. Resor, Greenwich, Connecticut
Private Collection, United States (by descent from the above)
Acquired from the above by the present owner

Henry McBride, “Modern Art,” The Dial, vol. 75, no. 6, December 1923, p. 621, an unidentified example.
Gaston Lachaise, “A Bronze,” The Dial, vol. 76, no. 1, January 1924, following p. 48, an unidentified example illustrated.
Gaston Lachaise: Sixteen Reproductions in Collotype of the Sculptor's Work, edited and with an introduction by A. E. Gallatin, New York, 1924, p. 52, Plate 6, an unidentified example illustrated.
Memorial Art Gallery, Catalogue of the Annual Exhibition of Contemporary American Paintings and Sculpture, exhibition catalogue, Rochester, N.Y., 1924, [n.p.], no. 136, an unidentified example.
Art Institute of Chicago, Catalogue of an Exhibition of Original Sculpture by Gaston Lachaise, exhibition catalogue, Chicago, 1925, [n.p.], no. 8, an unidentified example.
Wildenstein Galleries, Catalogue of the Exhibition of Tri-National Art: French, British, American, exhibition catalogue, New York, 1926, [n.p.], no. 58, an unidentified example.
Memorial Art Gallery (Rochester, N.Y.), January-February Exhibition: Contemporary American Paintings and Sculptures Selected from Recent Exhibitions in American Art Centers …, exhibition catalogue, Rochester, N.Y., 1929, [n.p.], no. 49, an unidentified example.
Buffalo Fine Arts Academy, Catalog of Exhibitions Commemorating the Twenty-fifth Anniversary of the Opening of the Albright Art Gallery, The Buffalo Fine Arts Academy, exhibition catalogue, Buffalo, N.Y., 1930, p. 24, no. 19, an unidentified example.
Baltimore Museum of Art, 200 Objects in the Baltimore Museum of Art: A Picture Book, Baltimore, Md., 1955, p. 77, another example illustrated.
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Gaston Lachaise 1882-1935: Sculpture and Drawings, exhibition catalogue, Los Angeles, Calif., 1963, [n.p.], no. 39, another example illustrated.
Portland Art Museum, Paintings, Drawings, Sculptures from the Collection of Caroline & Erwin Swann: "The Pleasures of the Eye," exhibition catalogue, Portland, Ore., 1964, p. 57, no. 74, another example illustrated.
Donald Bannard Goodall, "Gaston Lachaise, Sculptor," Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1969, vol. 1, pp. 283, 446, 541n. 40, 567; vol. 2: pp. 183-184, 464, Plate LXXXVI, another example illustrated.
Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester, Gaston Lachaise: Sculpture and Drawings, exhibition catalogue, Rochester, N.Y., 1979, no. 14, pp. 13, 30, no. 14, another example.
Williams College Museum of Art, Handbook of the Collection, Williamstown, Mass., 1979, n.p., no. 68, another example.
C. K. Carr and M. C. S. Christman, Gaston Lachaise: Portrait Sculpture, exhibition catalogue, Washington, D.C., 1985, pp. 14, 19, 70-71, another example illustrated.

in good condition
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.

According to the eyewitness account of American art critic Henry McBride 1867-1962), Augusta Hartman (1885-1960), sat for this “charming and poetic” statuette by Gaston Lachaise in the sculptor’s home in New York City’s Greenwich Village. The subject, nicknamed Gusta, and her husband, painter C. Bertram Hartman (1882-1960), were close friends of Lachaise and his wife.

According to Lachaise, the model for the statuette was created in 1922, and a series of seven bronze casts were produced by 1925. Other evidence shows that the first in the series was made in May 1923. Three of the casts are presently owned by the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Toledo Museum of Art, and the Williams College Museum of Art, Williamstown, Massachusetts. The other three are unlocated, and the plaster model is lost. The statuette is generally known as Girl with Bobbed Hair, the title attributed to it by John Kraushaar (1871-1946), Lachaise’s dealer in the 1920s.

The Lachaise Foundation, Boston, has given the number LF 39 to Portrait Statuette of Mrs. B. Hartman (Girl with Bobbed Hair). 

We are grateful to Virginia Budny for her assistance in preparing the catalogue entry for this work.