Olga Sacharoff

OLGA SACHAROFF (Tiflis, Georgia, 1889 - Barcelona, 1967).
"Turkeys".
Oil on canvas.
Signed in the lower margin.
Measurements: 65 x 54 cm; 75 x 64 cm (frame).

In "Turkeys", Olga Sacharoff masterfully displays her unmistakable pictorial vision, in which the everyday is transmuted into a symbolic scene, rich in chromatic lyricism and subtle irony. The subject (a turkey and a kettle in a domestic garden) is transformed into a chromatic explosion of great formal mastery. His very personal language combines deliberate ingenuity and compositional refinement.

The turkey, monumental and with a vibrant plumage of cerulean and cobalt blues, turns his neck to look at the turkey partially hidden behind him. She, more discreet, brings balance to the male's feathery exuberance. A choreography of ancestral courtship takes place between the two. The garden is insinuated with a curtain of softly delineated bushes, lilac flowers and daisies that provide touches of lush color, and an orange sienna ground. A red-tiled, whitewashed mansion stands out among the trees.

After studying at the School of Fine Arts in Tiflis, Sacharoff moved to Munich in 1910, where he came into contact with German expressionism. The following year he moved to Paris, where his work was initially influenced by Cézanne, and later evolved towards synthetic cubism. At the outbreak of the First World War Sacharoff moved to Spain, where he settled in 1915, passing first through Mallorca to finally settle in Barcelona the following year. In fact, some historians point out that she was the introducer of cubism in Barcelona. From there she collaborated in Francis Picabia's magazine "391", considered the mouthpiece of Dadaism and published in Barcelona. He exhibited works in the Salons d'Automne in Paris in 1920, 1921, 1922 and 1928, obtaining important praise from the press and managing to organize, in 1929, a solo exhibition at the Parisian gallery Bernheim Jeune, one of the most important of the time. During these years she held an exhibition at the Layetanas Galleries in Barcelona (1934) and participated in the Montjuic Salon, of which she was appointed a member in 1935. At the outbreak of the Civil War Sacharoff returned to Paris, and in 1939 she exhibited at the Perls Gallery in New York. After the war he returned to Barcelona, and left behind the avant-garde to immerse himself in a naïve taste close to the Catalan noucentisme. His style adopted lyrical and amiable traits, and he put himself at the service of an idealized vision of Catalonia: landscapes, customs, popular types, etc. In general, compositions with multiple characters predominate at this time, depicted with schematic strokes and vivid colors. Chosen by Camón Aznar, he participates in the I Salón de los Once de Eugenio D'Ors (1943), held at the Biosca Gallery in Madrid. Two years later he organized a retrospective of his Parisian work, and in 1960 the General Directorate of Fine Arts dedicated an anthological exhibition to him. In 1964 he was awarded the Medal of the City of Barcelona. Sacharoff also illustrated books, with examples such as "La casa de Claudine" by Colette (1944) and "Netochka Nezvanova" by Dostoevsky (1949). Recently an anthology was dedicated to her in duo with María Blanchard in Bilbao (BBK Exhibition Hall, 2002). Olga Sacharoff is represented in the Mapfre Foundation in Madrid, the Reina Sofia National Center, the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, the Museum of Art Nouveau and Art Deco Casa Lis, the Marés Museum, the Pablo Gargallo Museum in Zaragoza and the Monastery of Montserrat, among many others.