Paul Gauguin (1848-1903)
Lot 213 PROPERTY FROM AN IMPORTANT PRIVATE COLLECTION

Paul Gauguin (1848-1903)

Portrait d'enfant

Closed28 June 2017

Price Realised

GBP 42,500

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Paul Gauguin (1848-1903)
Portrait d'enfant
signed and inscribed 'Emil à son cousin Thaulow - 7 Février 1875 PGauguin' (on a business card)
watercolour on paper laid down on an original business card
sheet: 2 1/8 x 1 5/8 in. (5.2 x 4.1 cm.)
card: 3 ¾ x 2 3/8 in. (9.5 x 6.1 cm.)
Executed on 7 February 1875

Anonymous sale, Christie's, London, 19 March 1991, lot 13.
Private collection, Spain, by whom acquired at the above sale; sale, Christie's, London, 29 June 2000, lot 513.
Acquired at the above sale by the present owner.

Specialist note

The Wildenstein Institute has confirmed the authenticity of the present work with a certificate dated Paris, le 15 mai 2000, confirming that it will be included in their forthcoming catalogue raisonné de l'œuvre de Paul Gauguin.

Executed in February 1875 on a carte de visite, this watercolour is one of the earliest and most intimate portraits of Gauguin's first son Emil. Born in Paris on 31st August 1874, Emil was a baby of six months when Gauguin, at the time still working as a broker on the Parisian stock exchange, traced this most delicate bozzetto, dedicated to the boy's cousin - the son of Mette Gauguin's sister, Ingeborg Gad, and the painter Fritz Thaulow, whom she had married in October 1874. Fritz Thaulow was also Emil's godfather, when he was baptised at the Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Redemption, on 8 may 1875.