fig. 1
In 1924, the year of our drawing, Le Sidaner was at the pinnacle of his career. Throughout the summer of 1924, Le Sidaner worked in his garden on a series of works that he would exhibit in February 1925 at Galerie Georges Petit. The works were installed in the main hall of the gallery under the title, La Maison, Les heures et les saisons (The House, the Hours, and the Seasons). The exhibition was a huge triumph. The centerpiece of the show was a large canvas for which our drawing served as a study. Le Sidaner would come to regard La Table aux Lanternes, Gerberoy as his magnum opus.
Provenance
Studio of the artist
Thence by descent to his sons, Louis and Rémy Le Sidaner, 1939
Galleries Maurice Sternberg, Chicago (acquired directly from Louis Le Sidaner)
Private collection, mid-1990s
Thence by descent
Literature
Yann Farinaux-Le Sidaner, Le Sidaner: L’Œuvre Peint et Gravé, Paris, Éditions André
Sauret, 1989, no. 1161, p. 366.
Catalogue note
Our drawing depicts the small courtyard at Gerberoy, a space that held just as much significance in Le Sidaner’s oeuvre as the garden itself. It offered the artist an ideal setting for his recurring theme of tables filled with the accoutrements of a fine meal, a place where guests have only just left. It was there that, during the warmer months, the table was set for family or guests: “I can truthfully extol to you the coolness of the garden where we shall have lunch,” Le Sidaner would write to his friends.
In 1924, the year of our drawing, Le Sidaner was at the pinnacle of his career. Galerie Georges Petit, who had popularized his work, was selling his medium-sized canvases for 25,000 francs each (in the currency of the time). Throughout the summer of 1924, Le Sidaner worked in his garden on a series of works that he would exhibit in February 1925 at Galerie Georges Petit. The works were installed in the main hall of the gallery under the title, La Maison, Les heures et les saisons (The House, the Hours, and the Seasons). The exhibition was a huge triumph. The centerpiece of the show was a large canvas for which our drawing served as a study. The French art critic and Le Sidaner biographer, Camille Mauclair commented:
“Perhaps all his technical mastery as a painter, all his tenderness as a poet, and all his subtlety as a harmonizer are distilled in this Table aux lanternes – which seems to represent the very summation of his [Le Sidaner’s] gifts. The eye delights in the technical virtuosity, yet the heart is deeply moved by the sense of prayer that seems to rise from this symphony of serenity.”
Le Sidaner would come to regard La Table aux Lanternes, Gerberoy (fig. 1) as his magnum opus. As his exclusive contract with Galerie Georges Petit allowed him to retain one canvas per year, he kept the painting for the rest of his life. Le Sidaner’s sons eventually sold the oil and our preparatory drawing to the Chicago art dealer, Maurice Sternberg, who retained both works as part of his own private collection.
It is interesting to note that drawings by Le Sidaner are exceedingly rare. Kept in a chest of drawers in the painter’s studio, sadly, most of them were burned as fuel by the occupying forces during the winters of the Second World War.
This drawing will be included with a photo certificate from Yann Farinaux-Le Sidaner., and we are grateful to Monsieur Farinaux-Le Sidaner for contributing this essay.