Description:This beautifully rich scene comes alive with color and vivid imagery in a way that immerses its audience into a world of fantasy and whimsy. Carmine bursts with energy and captures the imagination of all who admire it.
Created in 1966 from a maquette for Chagall's "Triumph of Music," a series of 3 large-scale decorations created for the Metropolitan Opera House in New York (one being Carmine, The Magic Flute, Romeo and Juliet). Numbered from the edition of 200 in the lower right, this piece was pulled on Arches vellum paper and also hand signed by Marc Chagall in the lower right. A small inscription in the lower left states: 'D'Apres Marc Chagall - Ch. Sorlier Grav,' indicating Charles Sorlier as the publisher of the piece. Printed by Mourlot, Paris for the Editions of the Metropolitan Opera, New York.
Considered to be one of Chagall's most exquisite works, Carmine is an example of a musically rich and historic tradition to which Chagall wanted to pay homage. In the center, a whimsical mandolin player captures our attention, twirling his instrument and dressed in bright, colorful costume; this musician was later to be revealed as the artist's close confidante, Rudolf Bing, director of the Metropolitan Opera House at the time. It was a secret - yet recognizable - portrait of not only his friend, but the patron who commissioned this piece. It had been a tradition that dated back to the middle ages in which artists would include patrons in the pieces they commissioned, something Chagall had recognized and wanted to celebrate within this work.
Having had to adapt Carmine to a large-scale format to occupy the height of the façade of the Metropolitan Opera House, "Chagall was indefatigable in attempting time after time to achieve the desired result, with ever-increasing effectiveness" (Sorlier 110). The outcome was a meticulously detailed and marvelous work which is apparent in this poster format. Several retouches and color & compositional changes resulted in several months of perfecting the work. Carmine is proof of Chagall's enduring talent and skill of extracting each color, pushing it to its boldest and brightest to create a scene of dazzling performers set over a dreamy cityscape.
Catalogue Raisonné & COA:
It is fully documented and referenced in the below catalogue raisonnés and texts (copies will be enclosed as added documentation with the invoices that will accompany the final sale of the work):
1) Sorlier, Charles. Chagall's Posters, A Catalogue Raisonné, 1975. Detailed and illustrated on pg. 108-11
2) Sorlier, Charles. Chagall Lithographs, 1974-79, 1984. Listed on pg. 235 as plate CS 39.
About the Framing:
Framed in museum quality archival materials, this work is set in a Renaissance-inspired gold leaf frame. The bright gold of the moulding compliments the cool tones in the work, while the elaborate curvatures cast within the frame resonate the motion and richness of the piece itself. The simple stepped elements also accentuate the linear quality of this work. Completed with white, linen wrapped mattes and a matching gold inner fillet, this work is set behind archival Plexiglas.
