Félix Ziem
Beaune 1821 – Paris 1911
Seascape with sailing boats (recto); A view of Paris and a few sketches (verso)
Pen and brown ink, grey wash (recto); pen and brown ink, blue wash (verso)
Framing lines with pen and brown ink. Watermark F. JOHANNOT.
145 x 225 mm – 5 11/16 x 8 7/8 in.
Provenance – The artist’s studio, his stamp (Lugt 3707) lower right on the recto and lower center on the verso; Paris, Drouot, Laurent Bernard sale, 19 February 2021, lot 19; private collection.
Typical of this virtuoso artist’s drawings, this recto-verso sheet manifests his swift and liquid pen line which reveals his admiration for the Italian artists of the 18th century, particularly Venetian. It bears the stamp of the artist’s studio that his widow marked on the drawings left in his studio after his death, in 1912. The numbering – 1984 – indicates that it is a drawing which was catalogued in a typed inventory numbering 4998 drawings (see Fondation Custodia). The paper has the watermark of the Johannot family, an old Annonay family of paper producers. Johannot paper was famous for its excellent quality which shows Ziem’s exigence regarding his material.
Condition report – Good condition. Minor oxidations.
