Lot 191: PAUL-ÉMILE BORDUAS 1905 - 1960

PAUL-ÉMILE BORDUAS 1905 - 1960 LA VOLÉE 1954 signed and dated lower right Borduas 54; titled on a gallery label on the reverse 35.6 by 42.6 cm. 14 by 16 ¾ in.

François-Marc Gagnon, Paul-Émile Borduas, Montreal, 1988, p. 309

Dominion Gallery, Montreal

Private Collection, Toronto

La Volée was painted in New York in 1954, where Borduas, the acknowledged leader of the Automatistes, worked for two years, breaking with Surrealism, the basis of his art to that point, and absorbing some influences from Abstract Expressionism.

He exhibited both oils and watercolours separately and the critic Stuart Preston reviewed Borduas' watercolours:

...they carry delicacy of form and colour to a fastidious point, but their chief interest lies in the skill with which the sharp or fluffy shapes are painted... in Oriental art one finds a similar concern with calligraphic design and Borduas is a virtuoso draftsman as well as being a tasteful colourist.

This work could have been in the show.



© Estate of Paul-Émile Borduas / SODRAC (2011)