費爾南·雷捷

Galerie Simon (Daniel Henry Kahnweiler), Paris (acquired from the artist)

Sam Salz Inc., New York

Mr. & Mrs. Charles Goldman, New York (acquired from the above)

The Mathilde & Charles Goldman Foundation, New York (sold: Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York, March 21, 1962, lot 93)

Perls Gallery, New York (acquired at the above sale)

Dr. Karchmer, New York

Galerie Tarica, Paris

Acquired from the above by the present owners

Basel, Galerie Beyeler, Fernand Léger,1964, no. 15, illustrated in color in the catalogue

Chateauroux, Musée Bertrand, La section d'or, 2000, illustrated in color in the catalogue

Paris, Musée de la Vie Romantique, Malraux et la Modernité, 2002, illustrated in color in the catalogue

Barcelona, Fundació Joan Miró, Fernand Léger, 2002-03, illustrated in color in the catalogue

Lyon, Musée des Beaux Arts de Lyon, Fernand Léger, 2004, illustrated in color in the catalogue

Georges Bauquier, Fernand Léger, Catalogue raisonné de l’oeuvre peint, 1920-1924, Paris, 1992, no. 236, illustrated p. 77

"L'Exposition d'Ailleurs, Moderne Malraux," Dimanche, Geneva, December 16, 2001, detail illustrated p. 45

Good condition over all. The canvas has a glue lining, and the paint layer is stable. Under UV, the white element in the upper center and the area beneath the signature appear to have been retouched; there are tiny strokes of inpainting, mainly in the white areas, but also scattered throughout the composition.
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.

Élément mécanique is a gleaming symbol of technological progress in an age of rapid industrialization.  This composition is among a series of works from the immediate post-war period that celebrated the scale and breadth of industrial developement and its impact on modern life.  Léger's approach to these pictures incorporated the stylistic legacy of Synthetic Cubism and his Contrastes de formes series, but his philosophy behid them was a sharp departure from his pre-war compositions.  With the fabric of society having been torn asunder during the war, Léger's painting in 1919 was now concerned with glorification of social utility.  Construction, rather than Cubist deconstruction, was the defining theme of these images, which are essentially painted assemblages of factory-produced "mechanical elements" such as pipes, valves and metal cogs.  War-torn Europe was focused on the rebuilding of nations, and Léger felt a moral obligation to participate in this effort through his own art. He wrote to Léonce Rosenberg, "As soon as I was freed, I started to profit from those difficult years: I've reached a decision, and I'm modeling in pure local color and on a large scale without making any concessions" (quoted in Fernand Léger, 1911-1924, The Rhythm of Modern Life, New York, 1994, p. 68).

The present painting shows the artist's use of the traditional subject of the still life transformed by the fragmentation of the objects and space.  Léger's concentration on primary color avoids the transitions of light and shadows that indicate volume and spatial relationships, emphasizing the layered, two-dimensional character of the composition.  Léger's new conception of his painted surface involved the ability to depict the fragmented immediacy of objects; the frenetic simultaneity of modern life. 

 

Léger's composition here consists of many decontextualized machine elements, vertical, horizontal and diagonal bands of color, spheres and less clearly definable shapes that coexist with glimpses of modern urban architecture.  The resulting aesthetic is a bold statement that  has come to encapsulate the style of post-war Paris.   The work of this period has been memorably described by John Golding: “Now, at the height of his powers, he rendered architectural the compositional effects of synthetic Cubism to give definitive form to all that had been most positive, from a visual point of view, in the Futurist programme ... From synthetic Cubism Léger adapted a form of composition that relied for its effects on a surface organization in terms of predominantly upright, vertical areas, often tendered now in unmodulated colour. Mechanical, tubular forms, like great shafts of metal, appear with frequency, but these are now tied into, and indeed made subsidiary to a flatter treatment of the picture surface; the colored shapes tip and tilt, fanning out towards the edges of the canvas, only to meet opposing forces which tie them back again tightly into the overall, jazz-like rhythms of the composition. The bright raw colours call to each other across the surface of the canvas, pulling it taut like a drum. The vitality of the forms is such that at times they appear to advance towards us, so that we seem to share, palpably, in the painting’s beat. Some areas become cells in space, in which we glimpse the life of the city’s inhabitants; others are broken by letters, like fragments of giant billboards, while their harsh, dry imagery is thrown into relief by the contrasting, swirling, circular bands of colour. Never has the poetry of the first machine age been so grandly and proudly exalted” (J. Golding, “Léger and the Heroism of Modern Life,” in Léger and Purist Paris (exhibition catalogue), The Tate Gallery, London, 1970-71, p. 12).