Tamara Lempicka - the glamorous symbol of Art Deco

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

Painting by Tamara Lempitskaya has become one of the symbols of the Art Deco era. Often biographers go to extremes, focusing on the artist's turbulent social life. Do not forget that she was a hoax genius and a socialite, but first of all, Tamara Lempicka devoted her life entirely to painting. Despite the abundance of novels with women and men, art has always been her most passionate passion.

Youth

The artist's life story is full of white spots, and Tamara Lempicka herself is partly to blame for this. The biography was freely redrawn to appear in the most advantageous light. For example, at first, in order to hide her real age, she represented her daughter as her younger sister. She was born either in Moscow or, according to the artist herself, in Warsaw. And her name was not Tamara at all: at birth, the girl was christened Maria. Lempitsky is the surname of the first husband of the artist. And here is another inconsistency: if you believe the official year of birth (1898), it turns out that Tadeusz Lempicki was fascinated by a fourteen-year-old girl. It is possible, of course, that the Polishthe lawyer was greedy for nymphets, but with the same probability it can be assumed that Tamara knocked off several years for herself, and, according to some versions, the real year of her birth is 1895.

Be that as it may, some information remains reliable. The artist's mother, Malvina Dekler, was what is called a socialite, her father, Boris Gorsky, was a Russian banker of Jewish origin. A few years after the birth of his daughter, he disappeared without a trace, according to some versions, he committed suicide.

The first acquaintance with painting happened when Malvina Dekler ordered a portrait of her twelve-year-old daughter from one artist. Tamara did not like the picture at all and she said that she could do better. In the same year, she and her grandmother go to Italy, where the girl gets acquainted with the masterpieces of classical art. At the age of 14, Tamara was sent to study in Switzerland, after which she ends up in St. Petersburg.

First successes

In St. Petersburg, Tamara met her first husband, Tadeusz Lempitsky, from whom the artist gave birth to her only daughter, Kisetta. Looking ahead, it must be said that the girl was more interested in her mother as a model than as a daughter. Usually the girl lived with her grandmother and saw her mother very rarely. But the artist painted many of her portraits.

During the revolution, Tadeusz miraculously escaped execution, and the family emigrated to France. Here Tamara Lempicka begins to take painting lessons from A. Lot and M. Denis. Probably inherited fromfather's entrepreneurial talent, she quickly learned to sell her paintings at great profit and organize exhibitions. In 1922, the artist was already actively collaborating with the Salon d'Automne and the Salon des Indépendants. For the first time, on canvases and in catalogs, she signs the male pseudonym Lempitsky.

Flourishing

In 1925, especially for her first solo exhibition, Tamara Lempicka painted 28 paintings. One job at that time took her about three weeks. Equally, the artist loved high art and high society. The doors of fashionable salons and parties always flung open in front of her. She gladly gives herself to secular entertainment, starts numerous novels for inspiration, and may not appear at home for weeks. Tadeusz was tired of this way of life and in 1927 he fled from his wife to Poland. They divorced 4 years later, despite the artist's attempts to get him back.

By the end of the 1920s, Tamara Lempicka charges over 50,000 francs for a portrait. In terms of today's exchange rate, this is about 20,000 dollars. At this time, "Spring", "Kizette on the Balcony", "High Summer", "Girl with Gloves", "St. Moritz", "Beautiful Raffaella" were written. This is the pinnacle of her fame, after thirty orders it became less and less, and more criticism. Art Deco was losing popularity, and with it Lempicka as an artist. She was still a welcome guest at social events, but failures in creativity seriously bothered her.

The woman in the green Bugatti

Many people call this work a self-portrait, the artist herself had too much in common with the portrait. Lempicka writes it in1929. A little later, this work will be featured on the cover of Die Dame. From now on, the portrait will be considered the embodiment of the era and the modern woman - strong, independent, free and sensual. The composition is built diagonally, which gives the canvas dynamics. The color scheme is dominated by a combination of green and steel with ocher accents. The colors of the painting are radiant, extremely pure.

Life in America

After her marriage to Baron Raoul de Kuffner in 1933, the artist Tamara Lempicka left her first husband's surname, taking the sonorous prefix de from the second. A new phase of her life begins, this time in America. If at the beginning of the decade the trips were episodic, then by the beginning of the Second World War the family finally settled in New York. Lempicka herself called the United States a country of endless possibilities, but she turned out to be cruel to her. In America, the nickname “Baroness with a Tassel” stuck to her, criticism to smithereens smashed her work, and orders became less and less every year. The thirties include the works "Green Turban", "Portrait of Ira P.", "Portrait of Marjorie Ferry", "Straw Hat", "Woman with a Dove". The artist suffers from depression and lack of demand. In the late 30s and 40s, she increasingly creates canvases on a religious theme. The most frequent motif is the grieving Mother of God with tears in her eyes. In 1930, Lempicka wrote Teresa of Avila, one of his key works.

Teresa of Avila

This work is based on Bernini's baroque statue "The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa". The woman's face is given in a very close-up, it occupies the mainwork area. It reads complete detachment from the earthly world, immersion in other matters. Both suffering and bliss are equally read on it. The saint's shadowed eyes contrast with full, sensual, earthy lips.

Immediately striking is the sculptural nature of the portrait. All facial features - eyes, eyebrows, nose, lip fold - are finely and clearly defined. Perhaps the portrait is even more sculptural than the statue that served as the prototype. The folds of the veil on the head of St. Teresa are textured. The cape is so voluminous that it protrudes from the plane of the canvas.

There are two main colors in the coloring of the picture: steel and ocher. However, it does not look poor due to the abundance of halftones in the masterful work with chiaroscuro. The colors are bright and pure, as in other paintings by Lempicka, it seems that they do not glow. The picture is very expressive emotionally, it shows not only a good command of technique, but also a deep emotional involvement of the artist.

Career sunset

Lempicka spent 29 happy years married to the baron. It was the most passionate admirer of the artist's work, he idolized her and her paintings. When he died of a heart attack in 1962, Lempicka wrote that she had lost everything. She built a luxurious mansion in the Mexican province and moved there permanently. Until her last days, she was surrounded by luxury and young people. Next to her was her daughter Kisetta, who forgave her mother's inattention, and her granddaughter. Among the latest works of the artist "Surrealistic hand", "Portrait of Francoise Sagan", "Bowl with grapes".

In 1972, a large-scale exhibition of the artist was held in Luxembourg. Here were exhibited her best paintings, written in the heyday. Unexpectedly for everyone and for the artist herself, the exhibition became a resounding success among the younger generation. The aging Tamara Lempicka received many orders for the repetition of famous paintings. The paintings made as replicas, unfortunately, were significantly inferior to the originals. Over the years, the artist has lost her former hand confidence and clarity of color perception.

Lempicka died at the age of 81, in 1980. Undoubtedly, she would be pleased to know that today she is again among the most expensive artists. Retrospective exhibitions are held regularly. Her works are in private collections of many influential people. Madonna is one of the most dedicated connoisseurs of her work. The ashes of the artist, as she bequeathed, were scattered over the Mexican volcano Popocatepetl. Lempicka will forever remain a symbol of Art Deco and the tumultuous early 20th century for posterity.