MARCEL LEPRIN (1891-1933) La place Blanche Canvas,... Lot 57

MARCEL LEPRIN (1891-1933) La place Blanche Canvas, signed lower right, countersigned and titled on the back. Height 45.5, width 55 cm. Provenance: collection of Doctor Bensaude; by descent, Garches. Work to be put in relation with "Le moulin de la Galette" kept in the Carnavalet museum, Paris (P2157). "We know above all a Leprin landscape painter. As he produced a lot on the theme of Montmartre, an attempt was made at his beginnings to suffocate him in the great shadow of Maurice Utrillo. He had no difficulty in freeing himself from this shadow in the minds of those who, led by Suzanne Valadon, recognized the originality of his layouts and the choice of motives that were screened by his undeniable personality. His painting tells, without cheating. It betrays what he tries to keep secret. And this with a candor, an abandonment, a frankness, which forces us to enter his intimate domain, to walk around and listen to the stories he recorded, the stories he told himself". in Marcel Leprin et ses amis, Musée Galliera, imprimerie Kapp, p. 7.