Christie’s roundel
Lot 275

Max Ernst (1891-1976)

Untitled

Closed3 February 2010

Price Realised

GBP 51,650

More Information

How to sell

Max Ernst (1891-1976)
Untitled
signed and dated 'max ernst 1921' (lower right)
oil on photograph
8¼ x 5½ in. (21 x 14 cm.)
Executed in 1921; sold with Victor Hugo's frame and a poem by Paul Eluard

Valentine Hugo, Paris, by whom acquired directly from the artist.
Acquired from the above by the family of the present owner.

Specialist note

This work is sold with a photo-certificate from Werner Spies.

This watercolour first belonged to Valentine Hugo (1887-1968), a painter and illustrator who embraced the Surrealist movement between 1930 and 1936. She illustrated many Surrealist publications and foremost Paul Eluard's work.

During her Surrealist years she developed a taste for object. By combining Ernst's work with an antique frame belonging to Victor Hugo, the 19th century poet and the great-grandfather of her husband Jean Hugo, and a poem by Paul Eluard, she created an Objet Surrealist that dipped into different time zones and art categories, while narrating a story.