Marcel Gili (1914-1993) - Lot 139

Lot 139
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Estimation :
5000 - 7000 EUR
Marcel Gili (1914-1993) - Lot 139
Marcel Gili (1914-1993) Prometheus, Study, 1941 Terracotta print, no. 1 Signed and numbered (on the base): "gili", "1 70 x 20 x 15 cm Provenance: Private collection, France "Whether a Gili sculpture is monumental in scope or, on the contrary, a matter of intimate vision, it will always bear witness, through the happy rigor of its proportions, to the same sense of grandeur. Georges-Emmanuel Clancier At the age of 16, Marcel Gili entered the studio of the artist Gustave Violet in Perpignan. At his side, he participated in the realization of a 14-meter long bas-relief for the façade of a municipal building in the city of Toulouse. A stay in Paris encouraged him to meet Aristide Maillol in his studio in Marly-le-Roi, who then invited him to his studio in Banyuls-sur-Mer where he perfected his drawing. During his stays in Paris, he frequented the members of the Abstraction-Creation group, notably Robert Delaunay (1885-1941), Fernand Léger (1881-1955) and Raoul Dufy (1877-1953). With them, he participated in the first Salon d'Art Mural in 1935, but very quickly, he destroyed his abstract works and returned to figuration. In 1943 he helped organize the May Salon, of which he was a founding member, and in 1946 he received the Casa Velázquez Prize. After the war, his work gains in depth and gravity: he creates important monuments including a monumental terracotta for the city of Saint-Maur-des-Fossés and opens himself to other materials such as metal, copper and aluminum. He regularly participates in the Salon de la Jeune Sculpture, of which he is a member of the steering committee, as well as in numerous group exhibitions: the Venice Biennale in 1948; the Salon de l'Art Français in Tokyo, Antwerp, Milan and Brussels. Several personal exhibitions are dedicated to him in Paris, Bourges and later in Saint-Cyprien. After 1935, he concentrated on the human figure, both female and male, and produced a series of works on athletes between 1935 and 1939. Quickly, the serial work marks his detachment from the influence of Maillol and Prometheus representing a young naked man is part of the continuation of the series. Marcel Gili allows himself a freer interpretation of the body, here stretched in its height, concentrated inwards and contained by the feet bound in the earth. Even if Marcel Gili explores many materials, from the most traditional such as plaster to the most experimental such as polyester resin, earth remains his favorite material. This sculpture has no other versions and does not seem to have been published in bronze. Related literature - Exhibition of Forces nouvelles: paintings by Jannot, Humblot, Rohner, Venard; sculptures by Gili, Iché, cat.exp., Paris: Galerie Berri (June 28 - July 28, 1939), Paris, 1939. - Les étapes du nouvel art contemporain III et IV, cat.exp, Paris: Galerie Berri, ( 03 January - 17 January 1942), Paris, 1942. - René Letourneur, La sculpture française contemporaine, Monaco, Les documents d'art, 1944, p. 119, repr. - Marcel Gili : 200 œuvres récentes, peintures, sculptures, dessins, estampages, cat. exp., Bourges : Maison de la culture de Bourges, (14 mars - 22 avril 1969), Bourges, 1969. - Maxime Adam-Tessier, Baladi, Cyrille Bartolini, Louis Bec, Bédard, Alexandre Bonnier, Busse, Françoise Bret, Cali, César, Daniel Dezeuse, Jeanne Gatard, Klaus Geissler, Gérardin, Marcel Gili, Bernard Meadows, Michel Parré, François Pluchart, Silberman, cat. exp., Paris : Institut de l'Environnement, (April-May 1975), Paris, 1975. - Herbert Read, Nouveau dictionnaire de la sculpture moderne, Paris, Arted, 1984. - Collective, Marcel Gili, cat. exp., Paris: École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts, (07 - 16 January 1989), Paris, 1989. - Thierry Roche, Dictionnaire biographique des sculpteurs des années 1920-1930, Paris, Beau Fixe, 2007.
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