Les Bars, Homme et Femme au Comptoir c. 1908
Louis Auguste Legrand
* 1863 in Dijon † 1951 in Livry-Gargan
Charcoal and coloured chalks. Size of sheet: 63 x 41 cm.
Signed.
Watermark: Swan ‘Pellet et Legrand’.
A fine preparatory drawing for the artist’s own etching ‘Au Bar’ (A352).1
The etching follows the drawing for the most part, but with some small changes especially in the drapery of the clothes which have been amended and extended in detail in the print.
£ 6,500. -
From 1885, Louis Legrand was taught printmaking techniques by the Belgian artist Felicien Rops (1833-1898). Legrand depicted mainly in his prints and drawings the Parisian nightlife of the late nineteenth-century. Among his favourite subjects are prostitutes, dancers and bar scenes.
The paper sheet bears the watermark of Gustave Pellet (1859-1919), the publisher of all Louis Legrand’s prints. He commissioned special drawing and printing paper for his two most successful artist Legrand and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901).2
1 Victor Arwas, Louis Legrand: Catalogue Raisonné, London, 2006, no. 352.
2 similar watermark ‘G. Pellet/ T. Lautrec’ see: cf. Met 49.55.50.