Antoine-Louis Barye

With Durand-Ruel, Paris, by 1872;
Charles-Jean Binder, Paris, and Château de la Commanderie, L'Isle-Adam,
his sale, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, 8 April 1873, lot 16;
Guillaume de Gontaut Biron, Marquis de Biron, Paris and Geneva,
his sale and others, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, 25 March 1907, lot 78;
Stephen Higgins, Paris, by 1954;
Hector Gustave Brame, Paris;
R. Sturgis Ingersoll, Philadelphia and Penlyn, Pennsylvania,
his sale, New York, Sotheby's, 2 May 1974, lot 104;
with John & Paul Herring & Co., New York;
Private Foundation, California,
their sale, New York, Sotheby's, 26 May 1993, lot 33,
where acquired by the present owner

Paris, Galerie Martinet, Tableaux de l'école moderne tirés de collections d'amateurs, au profit de la caisse de secours des artistes, 1860, no. 3 (catalogue by F. Petit);
New York, Wildenstein, The Wild Kingdom of Antoine-Louis Barye (1795-1875), 1994, no. 12, mentioned pp. 24, 29, 42, 44, 116 (catalogue by J. Baillio)

Durand-Ruel, Recueil d'estampes: oeuvres de la collection Durand-Ruel, Paris 1872, no. 2;
C.O. Zieseniss, Les Aquarelles de Barye: études critique et catalogue raisonné, Paris 1954, p. 60, no. A.35, reproduced, pl. 6, fig. A. 35;

Laid down and window mounted (window mount glued down covering edges of sheet). Overall in good condition - pastel and watercolor fairly strong and fresh. Small, barely noticeable, losses at the lower margin in the center and at both left and right corners where sheet has been made up. Small glue stain in the upper right corner. Sold in a modern wood frame.
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.

Although known primarily as a sculptor and the most accomplished of the ‘animaliers', Barye is an unusual and extraordinary watercolorist.  His imaginative and emotive works on paper were very sought after already in his own time, by collectors in France and abroad, and especially in United States.  He was also rather prolific in this medium; the artist Jean Gigoux noted in 1894 ’…to occupy his time as he waited for his models or sculpture assistants, he would have some watercolour under way, a lion or some sort of gazelle.’¹ 

As has often been remarked, within the animal kingdom Barye had a special love of ferocious, large carnivores, ‘for him a metaphor of nature’s power’,² in its intrinsic grandeur and cruel violence.  In his images as in nature, both predator and prey often struggle to survive.  In this grand watercolor a lion strides across an open landscape, with typically slow and majestic movements, in search of prey.  The sculpted yet almost abstract landscape, with heavy rocks and sky and a solitary tree, envelops with its solidity the profile of the lion.  As Baillio has noted³, the colors are restricted to earth tones in various shades, except for the signature, which is as always in bold block letters, in the same format that Barye used for his sculpted work.  See also the following two lots. 

¹ J. Baillio, op. cit., 1994, p. 11 p. 24
² Ibid., p. 24
³ Ibid., p. 25