This auction has ended. View lot details
You may also be interested in


Mikhail Fedorovich Larionov(Russian/French, 1881-1964)Costume design for Le Soleil de Nuit unframed
Sold for £19,200 inc. premium
Looking for a similar item?
Our Russian Paintings and Works of Art specialists can help you find a similar item at an auction or via a private sale.
Find your local specialistMikhail Fedorovich Larionov (Russian/French, 1881-1964)
signed in Latin (lower right), inscribed 'No 3/Soleil de Nuit/1915' (upper left), verso signed in Latin (upper right), with label "# 36 Costume/ Ballet: "Soleil de Nuit" and later labels, numbers, inscriptions, and export stamps
pencil and watercolour on artist's board
38 x 26cm (14 15/16 x 10 1/4in).
unframed
Footnotes
Le Soleil de Nuit, or Le Soleil de Minuit marked Leonid Massine's choreographic debut with Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, with Massine himself dancing as Yarila in the premiere in 1915. The offered lot was Larionov's design for the Dance of the Buffoons for which 'Massine devised a succession of interwoven leaps, twists and turns. He wrote that these dancers had "tremendous gusto" and that "when the Buffoons entered carrying pigs' bladders on sticks, they banged them on the ground with such force that some of them shot into the orchestra pit"', (Leslie Norton, Léonide Massine and the 20th century ballet, McFarland, 2004, pp.22-23).

