Standing Bather, second version (Maillol, 1901-1902)

Aristide Maillol

Standing Bather, second version 1901-1902

Bronze with dark brown patina
Vollard edition begun in 1902
Model no.4, “Autre statuette femme debout le bras derrière le dos aussi”, Catalogue of the sculptures by Maillol produced in editions by Ambroise Vollard, compiled by Ursel Berger (2021 BERGER-LEBON, p. 14)
Sand cast by Florentin Godard (without foundry mark), executed between 1907 and 1937
Artist’s monogram (on the base at left): “AM”
67 x 19 x 14 cm

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Provenance

  • United Kingdom, Francis Haskell collection;
  • United Kingdom, private collection, by descent.

Bibliography

  • 1939 REWALD : John Rewald, Maillol, Paris, Éditions Hystérion, 1939, p. 72, repr. (unidentified bronze example).
  • 1996 CATALOGUE EXPOSITION MUSÉE BERLIN-LAUSANNE-BRÊME-MANNHEIM : commissariat de Ursel Berger, Jörg Zutter, Aristide Maillol, catalogue d’exposition [Berlin, Georg-Kolbe Museum, 14 janvier – 5 mai 1996, Lausanne, musée cantonal des beaux-arts, 15 mai – 22 septembre 1996, Brême, Gerhard Marcks Museum, 6 octobre 1996 – 13 janvier 1997, Mannheim, Städtische Kunsthalle, 25 janvier – 31 mars 1997], Paris, Flammarion-musée des Beaux-Arts de Lausanne, 1996, n°34, p. 92, repr. (example of the Niedersächsisches Landesmuseum).
  • 2007 CATALOGUE EXPOSITION MUSÉE NEW YORK-CHICAGO-PARIS : commissariat de Anne Roquebert, Ann Dumas, Douglas W. Druick, et. al., De Cézanne à Picasso. Chefs-d’œuvre de la galerie Vollard, catalogue d’exposition [New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 13 septembre 2006 – 7 janvier 2007, Chicago, The Art Institute of Chicago, 17 février – 12 mai 2007, Paris, musée d’Orsay, 19 juin – 16 septembre 2007], Paris, Musée d’Orsay-Réunion des musées nationaux, 2007, n°79, p. 184, repr. (example of the Rodin Museum).
  • 2009 CATALOGUE EXPOSITION FONDATION BARCELONE : Maillol, catalogue d’exposition [Barcelone, Fondation Caixa Catalunya, 20 octobre 2009 – 31 janvier 2010], Barcelone, Fondation Caixa Catalunya, 2009, p. 133, repr. (example of the Dina Vierny Gallery).
  • 2016 CATALOGUE EXPOSITION MUSÉE CÉRET : commissariat de Nathalie Galissot, Antoinette Le Normand-Romain, Maillol, Frère, Pons. Une Arcadie catalane, catalogue d’exposition [Céret, musée d’Art moderne, 2 juillet – 30 octobre 2016], Paris, Somogy éditions d’art-Céret, Musée d’Art moderne de Céret, 2016, p. 47, repr. (example of the Modern and Contemporary Art Museum of Strasbourg).
  • 2019 CATALOGUE EXPOSITION MUSÉE PERPIGNAN : commissariat de Claire Muchir, Antoinette Le Normand-Romain, Àlex Susanna, Rodin-Maillol. Face à face, catalogue d’exposition [Perpignan, musée Hyacinthe Rigaud, 22 juin – 3 novembre 2019], Milan, Silvana Editoriale, 2019, n°3, p. 70, repr. (example of the Rodin Museum).
  • 2019 CATALOGUE MUSÉE RODIN : Catherine Chevillot, Christine Lancestremère (sous la dir. de), Guide du musée Rodin, Paris, Éditions du Musée Rodin, 2019, n°93, p. 121, repr. (example of the Rodin Museum).
  • 2021 BERGER-LEBON : Ursel Berger, Élisabeth Lebon, Maillol (re)découvert, Paris, éditions Gourcuff Gradenigo, 2021, n°3, p. 76-77, repr.
  • 2022 CATALOGUE EXPOSITION MUSÉE PARIS-ZURICH-ROUBAIX : commissariat d’Ophélie Ferlier-Bouat, Antoinette Le Normand-Romain, Aristide Maillol (1861-1944). La quête de l’harmonie, catalogue d’exposition [Paris, musée d’Orsay, 12 avril – 21 août 2022, Zurich, Kunsthaus, 7 octobre 2022 – 22 janvier 2023, Roubaix, La Piscine-musée d’art et d’industrie André-Diligent, 18 février – 21 mai 2023], Paris, Gallimard-musée d’Orsay, 2022, n°105, p. 126, repr. (example of the Rodin Museum).
“Maillol is a sculptor as great as the greats... You see, in this little bronze, there's an example for everyone, old masters and young beginners alike... I'm glad to have seen it... If the word genius, misapplied to so many people today, still has a meaning, it's here... Yes, Maillol has the genius for sculpture... You'd have to be in bad faith, or very ignorant, not to recognize it. And what surety of taste!... What intelligence of life, in the simple!...” - Auguste Rodin[1]
 
The Ambroise Vollard exhibition in 1902
In 1902, from June 16th to 30th, Ambroise Vollard organized Aristide Maillol's first monographic exhibition in his gallery at 6, rue Laffitte. Thirty-three works were presented, including tapestries, screens, reliefs and statuettes in wood, terracotta, plaster and bronze, as well as decorative art objects.
 
1902 was a fruitful year for the Catalan sculptor: he took part in group exhibitions as early as January, at the Galerie B. Weill, and in May, at the Galerie Bernheim-Jeune. However, it was the exhibition organized by Vollard that proved a great success and introduced Maillol to art lovers.
 
Ambroise Vollard and Aristide Maillol signed a first contract on September 10, 1902, validating the sale of some of the sculptor's models “with full ownership and reproduction rights” to his dealer. This contract marked the first time Maillol had sold models. There were nine of them, including Standing Bather, second version.
 
The Standing Bather, a founding model recognized in artistic circles
The model of the Standing Bather is particularly important in Maillol’s work: it is probably at the origin of the collaboration between the sculptor and the dealer, and it inaugurates the bronze edition of Maillol’s sculptures by Vollard. The dealer mentions the anecdote in his memoirs: “I said to Maillol, who had just given the final chisel to a wooden statuette: - What if we made a bronze out of it? – A bronze? – Give me the statuette. I'll take care of it. And so, I produced Maillol's first bronze. Afterwards, I was to have a few other models from him of the highest quality.”[2]
 
The theme of the bather was dear to the Catalan sculptor, and we find it on numerous occasions throughout his career. In 1895 for example, it was already present in an oil on canvas titled Mediterranean[3], in which the female figure, standing naked in the center of a seascape, is surrounded by a long white drape blowing in the wind. The motif was later taken up again in sculpture by Maillol at the turn of the century. Reworked, the Standing Bather knows two versions. The two versions are nearly identical, with the exception of a few details: in the first version, the bather’s right arm is pressed alongside her body, and a drape covers her forearm; in contrast, the bather in the second version has no drape on her right arm, and it is slightly raised upwards. Another difference is that the bather in the second version wears a high bun atop her hair, which the first version does not have.
 
Other bathers, close to the Standing bather, appeared at the same time and in different materials (wood, bronze, terracotta). Some have the right arm raised towards the figure's head, the drapery falling all the way down their back, and wrapping around their left ankle[4] ; others have a slightly more accentuated contrapposto, the head turned to the left, and the drapery being held, this time, in front of them, with their left hand[5].
 
The model of the Standing Bather knows a great success: both versions entered the collections of art world personalities of the time. Around 1900, the Romanian-born princess Hélène Bibesco (1855-1902), a great pianist and Maillol's first patron, acquired Standing Bather, first version in wood. The work was also quickly spotted by Auguste Rodin (1840-1917), who acquired an example of Standing Bather, second version, an iron cast for his personal collection at Vollard’s gallery on April 2nd, 1904[6]. Following this purchase, Maillol sent a letter of thanks to Rodin, expressing his gratitude: “This is the true reward, the only one that the artist in love with his art hopes for his work, and furthermore, it is an encouragement to me. One walks more briskly in one's path when the great artist at the pinnacle of his glorious career casts a glance at the humble worker who comes behind him.”[7] Finally, an example of the Standing Bather, first version is represented on the mantelpiece in Ambroise Vollard’s portrait with a cat painted by Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947) around 1924[8].
 
Provenance & public collections
Eight examples of Standing Bather, second version can be found in public collections worldwide. Most of these were acquired by collectors who were then keen to donate the work to their local museum. In Europe, two examples are kept in France (in Paris, at the Rodin Museum: n°inv. S.00579 ; and in Troyes, at the Museum of Modern Art: n°inv. MNPL 1675), three in Germany (in Bremen, at the Kunsthalle Bremen : n°inv. Nr.587-1977/4 ; in Cologne, at the Ludwig Museum : n°inv. Nr ML76/SK 0064 ; and in Hanover, at the Niedersächsisches Landesmuseum : n°inv. Nr PPl 58), and one in Russia (in Saint-Petersburg, at the State Hermitage Museum : n°inv. H.CK1729). Finally, deux examples are kept in the United States (in Baltimore, at the Museum of Art: n°inv. 1941.120; and in Philadelphia, at the Philadelphia Museum of Art: n°inv. 1963-181-94).
           
Our example comes from the personal collection of British-born art historian Francis Haskell (1928-2000). Professor at King's College, Cambridge, and later at Oxford University, Haskell published a number of seminal works that have become benchmarks in art history. His work focuses on the social history of art, in other words, the study of the elements surrounding artistic creation, as well as the study of artistic life and milieu, the critical reception of works, and the museum environment. He focused more precisely on the history of patronage and the art market in 17th and 18thcentury-Italy (Patrons and Painters, 1963), the history of taste (Rediscoveries in Art, 1976 ; Taste and the Antique, 1981), and Museums interest in retrospectives of Old Master works (The Ephemeral Museum, 2000). The Standing Bather, second version remained in the historian’s family after his death.
[1] Quoted by Octave Mirbeau in Aristide Maillol, Paris, Société des Dilettantes, 1921, p. 29.
[2] Ambroise Vollard, Souvenirs d’un marchand de tableaux, Paris, Éditions Albin Michel, 1937, p. 302.
[3] Aristide Maillol, Mediterranean, circa 1895, oil on canvas, 96,5 x 105,5 cm, Paris, Petit Palais-musée des beaux-arts de la Ville de Paris, n°inv. PPP2278.
[4] Grande baigneuse debout, 1900, bois, in 2009 CATALOGUE EXPOSITION FONDATION, p. 31, repr.
[5] Aristide Maillol, Holding back her veil, s.d., terracotta, 79 x 16 x 12 cm, in Catalogue des Tableaux modernes, aquarelles, pastels, dessins, sculptures, composant la collection Octave Mirbeau, sales catalogue [commissaire-priseur F. Lair-Dubreuil, experts Bernheim-Jeune, Durand-Ruel, A. Vollard, Paris, Galerie Durand-Ruel, 24 février 1919], Paris, Moderne Imprimerie, 1919, NP, n°66, repr. [en ligne : https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k6572706v/f105.item.r=vente%20collection%20Octave%20Mirbeau%201919].
[6] The invoice is kept in the Rodin Museum’s archives, see 2007 CATALOGUE EXPOSITION MUSÉE NEW YORK-CHICAGO-PARIS, notice n°79, p. 101, accessible via the catalogue’s CD.
[7] Letter quoted in 2007 CATALOGUE EXPOSITION MUSÉE NEW YORK-CHICAGO-PARIS, notice n°79, p. 101, accessible via the catalogue’s CD.
[8] Pierre Bonnard, Portrait of Ambroise Vollard with cat, circa 1924, oil on canvas, 96,5 x 111 cm, Paris, Petit Palais-musée des beaux-arts de la Ville de Paris, n°inv. PPP3052. The work is reproduced in 2022 CATALOGUE EXPOSITION MUSÉE PARIS-ZURICH-ROUBAIX, n°106, p. 127.