The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of April 24, 2024

Landscape at Le Lavandou

1952

Nicolas de Stael

(French, 1914–1955)

France

oil on canvas

Unframed: 37.8 x 81 cm (14 7/8 x 31 7/8 in.)

Nancy F. and Joseph P. Keithley Collection Gift 2020.121

Location: not on view

Did You Know?

The favorite artist of French New Wave filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard, De Staël is cited as an influence on the use of primary colors in the 1965 film Pierrot Le Fou.

Description

Nicolas de Stael painted Landscape at Le Lavandou at a major turning point in his artistic development. After years of painting abstract compositions in the studio, he surprised his contemporaries when he began working outdoors in 1952. Seeking greater contact with nature, he spent his last years working largely along the Mediterranean coast. His attempt at reconciling abstraction and figuration, not valuing one over the other, was regarded as a breakthrough toward a more lyrical, French form of abstraction in the tradition of Paul Cézanne, Georges Braque, and Henri Matisse. The long, horizontal composition in this painting is divided into zones of blue and red that evoke associations with land and sea.

before 1967
Alexandre Farra, Paris, France
1969
(Galerie Brame, Paris, France, sold to Rachel Lambert (Mrs. Paul) Mellon [1911–2014])
1969–2014
Rachel Lambert (Mrs. Paul) Mellon [1911–2014]
November 10, 2014
(Sotheby's, New York, NY, Property from the Collection of Mrs. Paul Mellon, November 10, 2014, lot 10, sold to Nancy F. and Joseph P. Keithley)
2014–2020
Nancy F. and Joseph P. Keithley, Cleveland, OH, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art
2020–
The Cleveland Museum of Art
Provenance Footnotes
1 “Nicolas de Staël (1914–1955): Peintures et Dessins,” Galerie Motte, Geneva, July-August 1967, cat. no. 24, notes the painting was previously in the Collection Farra, Paris.
2 According to Germain Viatte, André Chastel, and Anne de Staël, Nicolas de Staël: Catalogue Raisonné de l'Oeuvre Peint (Neuchâtel: Ides et Calendes, 1997), p. 378, cat. no. 498, ill.
3 According to Germain Viatte, André Chastel, and Anne de Staël, Nicolas de Staël: Catalogue Raisonné de l'Oeuvre Peint (Neuchâtel: Ides et Calendes, 1997), p. 378, cat. no. 498, ill.
Staël, Nicolas de, André Chastel, Germain Viatte, Jacques Dubourg, and Françoise de Staël. Nicolas De Staël. Paris, France: le Temps 1968. Reproduced: p. 183, cat. no. 362
Viatte, Germain, André Chastel, and Anne de Staël. Nicolas de Staël: catalogue raisonné de l'œuvre peint. Neuchâtel, Switzerland: Ides et Calendes, 1997. Reproduced: p. 378, no. 498
Nicolas de Staël, 1914-1955: Peintures et Dessins: Juillet-Août 1967. Genève: Galerie Motte, 1967. Mentioned and reproduced: P. 16, no. 24
Impressionism to Modernism: The Keithley Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 11, 2022-January 8, 2023).
Nicolas de Staël (1914-1955): Peintures et Dessins, Galerie Motte, Geneva, Switzerland, (July-August 1967)
{{cite web|title=Landscape at Le Lavandou|url=false|author=Nicolas de Stael|year=1952|access-date=24 April 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2020.121