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Youri Pavlovitch ANNENKOV known as Georges ANNENKOFF (Petrop…
See original version (French)
104
-
Youri Pavlovitch ANNENKOV known as Georges ANNENKOFF (Petrop…
See original version (French)
Estimate €80,000 - €120,000
Voluntary lot
Description
Youri Pavlovitch ANNENKOV known as Georges ANNENKOFF (Petropavlovsk, 1889 - Paris, 1974)
Still life (circa 1928)
Oil on canvas, signed lower left "G. ANNENKOFF".
In its original frame.
H. 90 x W. 71 cm.
Exhibition
Exhibition of ancient and modern Russian art organised by the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels in 1928, n°510 (label on the back of the frame).
Provenance
- Acquired in 1928 by Armand KRINGS (1898-?), the current owner's grandfather.
- Then by descent.
History
In Georges Annenkoff's work, still life never appears as a simple exercise in style; on the contrary, it constitutes a space of retreat, almost of resistance, within a body of work largely dominated by the portrait and the representation of the figures of his time. Trained in St Petersburg and immersed in the circles of the Russian avant-garde, Annenkoff established himself during the revolutionary years as an acute observer of the faces of History. His portraits, taut and analytical, sought to capture the individual in all his intellectual and psychological complexity.
His exile in Paris from 1924 profoundly altered this position. While he successfully pursued his career as a portrait painter in literary and political circles, from Gide to Cocteau, from Mauriac to Elsa Triolet, from Maurice Paz to Léon Blum, his work also opened up to quieter forms. Still lifes, which emerged occasionally but significantly, reflected a shift in the way she looked at things. After questioning figures, Annenkoff turned to objects, not as secondary motifs, but as sites for a more interior pictorial experience. They offer a terrain where the tension inherent in portraiture is resolved, where analysis gradually gives way to a form of plastic meditation.
This is the context of the painting shown here, exhibited in 1928 at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Brussels under the title Nature morte. The composition, centred on a bouquet in a jug, is organised around a few everyday objects, a pipe and a knife, whose discreet presence introduces an indirect human dimension. The space is structured by a succession of planes, a curtain, a balustrade and an opening, giving the scene a measured, almost theatrical depth. The palette, dominated by muted blues and greys, is punctuated by brighter accents in the floral treatment, without ever upsetting the overall balance. The material, worked by repetition and erasure, contributes to this search for an unstable form, where the contours slip away to the benefit of a more diffuse perception.
As is often the case in Annenkoff's still lifes, the table becomes a place of condensation. The objects, isolated, acquire an autonomous presence, freed from any descriptive function. Here, still life is no longer a decorative affair, but a deeper reflection on permanence and disappearance, on what remains when the human figure withdraws.
The work was presented in May-June 1928 at the exhibition of ancient and modern Russian art organised by the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, under number 510, alongside four other paintings. It was most likely after this exhibition that Armand Krings acquired it, and it has remained in his family to this day.
Born in Mol, in the province of Antwerp, in 1898, Armand Krings belonged to a family of textile industrialists associated with Lainière de la Campine. He developed a keen interest in art from an early age, and grew up in an environment conducive to artistic encounters. During family visits to Ostend, he rubbed shoulders with the likes of Constant Permeke and James Ensor, while the painter Jakob Smits was a close family friend.
In the 1920s, he divided his time between Brussels and Paris. Settling in the French capital, in a flat above the Olympia, where his next-door neighbour was none other than Mistinguett, he frequented the artistic circles of Montparnasse and began to build up a significant collection. He acquired works by Foujita, Raoul Dufy, Vlaminck and Marie Laurencin, as well as artists from the École de Paris such as Mané-Katz, Menkes and Léon Zack. This involvement in artistic networks was further strengthened by his links with Geneviève Gallibert, a pupil of Dufy and close friend of Jules Pascin, and with Nico Mazaraki, a Greek dealer and collector whose portrait Dufy painted, now in the Centre Pompidou.
This work, which has remained in the family to this day, bears witness not only to Krings' sensitivity to the artistic scene of his time, but also to his interest in the Russian arts and literature, which he readily associated with the world of the great composers to whom he listened with passion.
Through the convergence of its formal qualities - the size of its format, the rigour of its construction, the great subtlety of its light and the density of its pictorial material - as well as its unprecedented character, the work having not been shown to the public since 1928, this still life stands out as one of the most accomplished and ambitious works of Annenkoff's Parisian period.
See original version (French)
Auto-translation. Refer to original language for legal validity.
Lot description modified on 06/02/2026 at 4:07 PM
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