Josep Maria Sert

JOSEP MARÍA SERT (Barcelona, 1874 - 1945).
"Centaures i figures. Paris, ca. 1913.
Preparatory charcoal drawing on paper adhered to board.
Presents signature and dedication in the lower left corner "Herva de Regnier (?) / hommage respectueux JM Sert".
Attached certificate of authenticity issued by the Institut Amatller d'Art Hispànic.
The frame is slightly damaged.
Measurements: 43 x 113 cm; 57,5 x 125,5 cm (frame).
In 1913, Sert painted the decoration of two adjoining rooms (the ballroom and the music room) in the residence of Sir Saxton Noble, in Kent House, London. In the first of these rooms, also known as the Hall of the Bocraneans, the artist depicted two large scenes, one dedicated to the Triumph of Bacchus and a second that could correspond to the Triumph of Orpheus. The drawing in question shows remarkable compositional and conceptual coincidences with the aforementioned works, so that it is fully justified to consider it as a preliminary study for this decorative ensemble. Thus we see how the two centaurs on the right are very close to those of the Triumph of Orpheus; or how the center of the scene is occupied by a couple of young people, while the centaur on the left occupies the same space as the group of pachyderms of the final work, being necessary to highlight the formal equivalence that occurs between the garland held by the two children of the study and the trunk of the elephant closest to the viewer of the painting. At the same time, it should be noted that some of the motifs found in the drawing seem to have been transferred to the Triumph of Bacchus, such as the reference to the central couple, the fanciful ligature of the young protagonist that corresponds to the crowns of screens of several characters in the painting, or the multitude of large tubs that occupy the background of the composition.
Trained with Benito Mercadé and Pere Borrell, Sert was a member of the Círculo Artístico de Sant Lluc, and later a disciple of A. de Riquer. In 1900 Torras i Bages commissioned a large mural decoration for the cathedral of Vic, of which he presented sketches and preparatory canvases in 1905 and 1907 in Barcelona and Paris, of which this piece is an example. Through his exhibitions abroad, he soon acquired extraordinary prestige among the French and English aristocracy, for whom he created sumptuous decorations. In 1908 he decorated the Sala de los Pasos Perdidos of the Palace of Justice in Barcelona, and in 1910 he presented at the Salon d'Automne in Paris the mural decoration of the ballroom of the Marquis of Alella (Barcelona) and decorated the music room of the Princess of Polignac in Paris. Two years later he exhibited an important group of works at the Salon in the French capital. In the following years he worked for Queen Victoria Eugenia (Santander) and for Robert Rotschild (Chantilly), and exhibited individually in London, in the Agnew room. In 1920 he married Maria Godebska, "Misia", a muse of the Parisian artistic scene, in Paris. He made new murals for important houses in Park Lane (England), Buenos Aires, Palm Beach and Paris, and in 1926 he made, before a great expectation, an exhibition of his works for the cathedral of Vic the Jeu de Paume in Paris. In 1927, with the support of his friend and protector Francesc Cambó, he completed the main part of the cathedral's decoration, which was completed with the construction of the lunettes between 1928 and 1929. In 1930 he was named academician of San Fernando, and in the following years he worked all over the world, creating important murals such as those of the Waldorf Astoria in New York, the chapel of the Palacio de Liria in Madrid or the council hall of the League of Nations in Geneva. He was the most eminent decorative painter of his time, and his style was characterized by a great imagination at the service of a rhetorical language influenced by orientalism and Goya's expressionism.