Fernand Lger, Composition, Cirque, Lithographies Originales, Lithograph

Condition: Pre-Owned
Lithograph on vlin dArches paper. Paper size: 16.63 x 12.69 inches. Excellent condition. Unsigned and unnumbered, as issued. Notes: From the folio, Cirque, Lithographies Originales, 1950. Published by Les ditions Verve, Paris, under the direction of Triade, diteur, Paris; printed by Mourlot Frres, Paris, October 5, 1950. Excerpted from the folio (translated from French), "Cirque" is entirely composed, handwritten text and illustrations, of original lithographs by Fernand Lger. This album was produced by Fernand Lger with the collaboration of Triade and Marguerite Lang. It was completed printing on the presses de Mourlot Frres, on October 5, 1950, for Les ditions Verve, Paris. The edition of this album includes II, CCLXXX examples numbered from I to CCLXXX and XX hors-commerce examples. Numbered from I to XX. All examples, on vlin d'Arches, are signed by the artist [on the colophon].

Catalogue raisonn reference: Lger, F., & Saphire, L. (1978). Fernand Lger : the complete graphic work. Blue Moon Press, 44-106.

History of the edition: Cirque was originally conceived as a collaboration between Fernand Lger and the novelist Henry Miller. At a time when the two were interested in working together, the publisher Efstratios Triade Lger approached Leger to make prints for an artists book. Triade hoped to publish a series of such books with the circus as the theme. Lger was a circus enthusiast who often used circus images in his paintings. He often went to the Cirque Mdrano in Paris and the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus in New York. He agreed to the project and suggested that Miller write the text. Miller wrote a tragic tale of a disenchanted clown (published as The Smile at the Foot of the Ladder), which Triade rejected. He had published two earlier circus-related projects, Rouaults Divertissement and Matisses Jazz. Both artists had written their texts, so he asked Lger to write Cirque. Lger wrote about life and art framed within the context of the circle, which he saw as symbolic of wholeness, continuity and freedom. To Lger the circus and the circle were inseparable: What is a circus if not a machine that produces circles? acrobats, horseback riders, bicycles, clowns, animalson a perfectly round ring Go to the circus, quit your rectanglesand you go to the land of circles in action.

FERNAND LEGER (1881-1955) was a French painter, sculptor, and filmmaker. In his early works he created a personal form of cubism (known as "tubism") which he gradually modified into a more figurative, populist style. His boldly simplified treatment of modern subject matter has caused him to be regarded as a forerunner of pop art. Lger was born in Argentan, Orne, Lower Normandy, where his father raised cattle. Fernand Lger initially trained as an architect from 1897 to 1899, before moving in 1900 to Paris, where he supported himself as an architectural draftsman. After military service in Versailles, Yvelines, in 19021903, he enrolled at the School of Decorative Arts after his application to the cole des Beaux-Arts was rejected. He nevertheless attended the Beaux-Arts as a non-enrolled student, spending what he described as "three empty and useless years" studying with Grme and others, while also studying at the Acadmie Julian. He began to work seriously as a painter only at the age of 25. At this point his work showed the influence of impressionism, as seen in Le Jardin de ma mre (My Mother's Garden) of 1905, one of the few paintings from this period that he did not later destroy. A new emphasis on drawing and geometry appeared in Lger's work after he saw the Czanne retrospective at the Salon d'Automne in 1907. In 1909, he moved to Montparnasse and met Alexander Archipenko, Jacques Lipchitz, Marc Chagall, Joseph Csaky and Robert Delaunay. In 1910, he exhibited at the Salon d'Automne in the same room (salle VIII) as Jean Metzinger and Henri Le Fauconnier. In his major painting of this period, Nudes in the Forest, Lger displays a personal form of Cubism that his critics termed "Tubism" for its emphasis on cylindrical forms. In 1911, the hanging committee of the Salon des Indpendants placed together the painters identified as 'Cubists'. Metzinger, Albert Gleizes, Le Fauconnier, Delaunay and Lger were responsible for revealing Cubism to the general public for the first time as an organized group. The following year he again exhibited at the Salon d'Automne and Indpendants with the Cubists, and joined with several artists, including Le Fauconnier, Metzinger, Gleizes, Francis Picabia and the Duchamp brothers, Jacques Villon, Raymond Duchamp-Villon and Marcel Duchamp to form the Puteaux Groupalso called the Section d'Or (The Golden Section) paintings, from then until 1914, became increasingly abstract. Their tubular, conical, and cubed forms are laconically rendered in rough patches of primary colors plus green, black and white, as seen in the series of paintings with the title Contrasting Forms. Lger made no use of the collage technique pioneered by Braque and Picasso.
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