ADOLPHE MOURON CASSANDRE (1901-1968)L'ART DECORATIF & LA PEINTURE MODERNE FRANCAISE / LORD AND TAYLOR. 1927. 11 3/4x6 3/4 inches, 29 3/4x17 cm. Condition A. Printed on wood. Matted and framed. This unpublished maquette is Cassandre's only known work on wood. It is most likely a self portrait and depicts the artist's head in the form of a palette with a star, a symbol of creativity, emerging from his brain. The post-Cubist, poetic and elegant image is Cassandre at his painterly best. This project was for the catalogue cover for the seminal exhibition at New York's Lord & Taylor department store. Held in 1928, the exhibition was the brainchild of Dorothy Shaver, the store's Fashion Director and then President. She was inspired by the 1925 Art Deco exhibition in Paris, and her goal was to showcase for the American market French furniture and house hold objects designed in this new style. The exhibition was designed by Eli Jacques Kahn and was punctuated by artwork created by France's avant-garde artists. The design ultimately selected for catalogue of the show showed abstract images of objects (a palette, a vase etc). Although not signed, it is also clearly the work of Cassandre. Probably because the show featured household items, this design was rejected. Such was the success and popularity of the show that Macy's, Saks Fifth Avenue and other major department stores shortly followed suit, hosting similar exhibitions of their own. Cassandre / Suntory p. 65, Cassandre / Bibliotheque Nationale p. 45.
