Raoul Dufy

RAOUL DUFY (Le Havre, 1877 - Forcalquier, 1953)
"Seated woman", ca. 1910.
Pencil on paper.
Signed on the lower right.
Provenance: Funds of Pierre Bergé & Associés, Paris.
Measurements: 22.5 x 20.5 cm, 35.5 x 33.5 cm (frame).

Pencil drawing made by Raoul Dufy around 1910, a stage in which the artist consolidates a graphic language of great freedom, marked by the rapidity of the stroke and the immediate capture of the figure. The work represents a seated woman, possibly in an interior, accompanied by barely suggested elements, such as a bouquet or floral motif on the left.

The work reflects the artist's interest in drawing as an autonomous medium, capable of synthesizing form, movement and character with a very modern economy of resources. The nervous stroke, the compositional lightness and the importance given to the emptiness of the paper are linked to the sensibility of the Parisian avant-garde of the early twentieth century, in which Dufy participated from a personal position, between Fauvism, everyday observation and modern decorativism.

Raoul Dufy was a painter, graphic artist and textile designer, recognized for a decorative, luminous language of great chromatic freedom. He trained at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Le Havre and, from 1900, at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where he met Georges Braque. He began exhibiting in Paris at Berthe Weill's gallery.

After a first stage influenced by impressionism, the impact of Matisse at the 1905 Salon des Indépendants oriented his painting towards fauvism. Later, contact with Cézanne and his cubist experiments contributed to the definition of his own style, based on agile structures, synthetic drawing and color applied with great spontaneity.

His work dealt with themes such as maritime scenes, parties, concerts, horse races, flowers, interiors and nudes. He is represented in museums such as the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, the Van Abbemuseum, the McNay Art Museum and the Art Gallery of Ontario, among others.