Marcel Gili (1914-1993) - Lot 259

Marcel Gili (1914-1993) Prometheus, Study, 1941 Terracotta proof, no. 1 Signed and numbered (on base): "gili", "1". 70 x 20 x 15 cm Provenance: Private collection, France "Whether a sculpture by Gili is monumental in its intent or intimate in its 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 joined artist Gustave Violet's studio in Perpignan. Working alongside him, he was commissioned to create a 14-meter bas-relief for the façade of a municipal building in Toulouse. A stay in Paris encourages him to meet Aristide Maillol at his studio in Marly-le-Roi, who then invites him to his studio in Banyuls-sur-Mer, where he perfects his drawing skills. During his stays in Paris, he frequented members of the Abstraction-Création group, notably Robert Delaunay (1885-1941), Fernand Léger (1881-1955) and Raoul Dufy (1877-1953). With them, he took part in the first Salon d'Art Mural in 1935, but soon destroyed his abstract works and returned to figuration. In 1943, he helped organize the Salon de Mai, of which he was a founding member, and in 1946 received the Casa Veláz- quez Prize. After the war, his work gained in depth and gravity: he created major monuments, including a monumental terracotta for the town of Saint-Maur-des-Fossés, and opened up to other materials such as metal, copper and aluminum. He regularly takes part in the Salon de la Jeune Sculpture, of which he is a member of the steering committee, and in numerous group exhibitions: Venice Biennial in 1948; Salon de l'Art Français in Tokyo, Antwerp, Milan, Brussels. He held several solo exhibitions in Paris, Bourges and later in Saint-Cyprien. After 1935, he concentrated on the human figure, both male and female, with a series of works on athletes between 1935 and 1939. His serial work soon marked his detachment from the influence of Maillol, and Prométhée, depicting a naked young man, was an extension of the series. Marcel Gili allows himself a freer interpretation of the body, here stretched to its full height, concentrated inward and contained by the feet bound in the earth. Although Marcel Gili explores a wide range of materials, from the more traditional like plaster to the more experimental like polyester resin, earth remains his material of choice. There are no other versions of this sculpture, nor does it appear to have been produced in bronze. Related literature - Forces nouvelles exhibition: 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 janvier - 17 janvier 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. - Collectif, Marcel Gili, cat. exp. exhibition, 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.