420 - Georges PAPAZOFF (1894–1972)

Georges PAPAZOFF (1894–1972) Man’s Face Oil on canvas Signed lower left Sticker on the back: “Papazoff 113 50F 116 x 89” 116 x 89 cm The buyer is responsible for the buyer’s premium. PROVENANCE: Acquired from François Tournié in the 1960s or 1970s, a family friend, then passed down to the current owner The condition report is available upon request at the following email address: contact@neo-encheres.com Description: Born in Yambol, Bulgaria, in 1894, Georges Papazoff trained in Prague and then in Munich at Hans Hofmann’s school. Upon arriving in Paris in 1924, he was welcomed into the art world by Jules Pascin. A maverick of Surrealism, he exhibited with the group without being a member, and as early as the 1920s appeared alongside Jean Arp, Max Ernst, and Joan Miró in the movement’s first exhibitions in the United States. The influence of Paul Klee and his friendship with André Derain—to whom he dedicated two books—shaped his career. A contemporary in Montparnasse of Marc Chagall, Chaïm Soutine, and Serge Charchoune, he belonged to that generation of Eastern European artists who revitalized the École de Paris, while the Russian émigré community brought there Constantin Korovine, Alexander Iacovleff, Mikhail Larionov, and Natalia Goncharova. His works are held, notably, at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, the Yale University Art Gallery (Katherine Dreier’s Société Anonyme collection), the Petit Palais in Geneva, and the Centre Pompidou. He died in Vence in 1972. This large-format *Face of a Man*, like the previous lot, comes from the Françoise Tournié Gallery.