?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 20,000 - $ 30,000
(PICASSO, PABLO.) Buffon, Georges Louis Marie Leclerc. Eaux-Fortes originales pour des textes de Buffon . 31 hors texte plates with etchings and aquatint, by Picasso, printed by Roger Lacourière with text set by Marthe Fequet and Pierre Baudier. 375x280 mm; 14 3/4x11 inches, sheets. Folio; contents loose as issued in printed wrappers; original glassine, original board chemise and slipcase, both reinforced at joints, edges, and folds, with grey cloth tape. From the property of the descendants of Mary S. Collins. Paris: Martin Fabiani, 1942
number 54 of only 55 copies printed on vélin de montval from the total edition of 226. Picasso's take on the great bestiary. He began the etchings in 1936 and promised them to Vollard, who died before their completion, leaving Vollard's associate, Fabiani, to see it to completion. "The master printer Lacourière had introduced Picasso, as well as Rouault and other artists, to the lift-ground or sugar aquatint process, which allowed a variety of tones and textures within a limited range. The spontaneity of the plates is attested by the freehand margins, the rapidly drawn line, and the use of fingerprints for textural variety"--The Artist & Book 231; Cramer & Goeppert 37; Rauch 61.
