?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 20,000 - $ 30,000
ÉDOUARD MANET Les Courses.
Lithograph on heavy wove paper, 1865-72. 387x511 mm; 15 1/4x20 1/8 inches, wide margins. Third state (of 3). An artist's proof in this state, aside from the edition of 50 on Chine appliqué. Printed by Lemercier & Cie, with the address lower center. Ex-collection Henri M. Petiet, Paris, with the ink stamp verso (see Lugt 2021a). A superb impression of this extremely scarce, important lithograph.
Manet's (1832-1883) work, with its bold subjects, stark contrasts and bravura handling, paved the way for Impressionism. Like the Impressionists--Degas, Renoir, Pissarro and others--Manet was shunned by many critics. His Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe, 1863 (see lot 49), though now considered an icon of 19th-century art, was not accepted for the annual Paris Salon and was instead exhibited at the counter-establishment Salon des Refusés. This lithograph shows Manet's drawing at its most vigorous. The viewpoint from the center of the track, with oncoming, stampeding horses, is exceptionally modern. The bold scribbling in the lower right corner, with the lithographic crayon used on its side as well as its point, anticipates modern and contemporary lithography. Guérin 72; Harris 41.
