Modern and Contemporary Art Head Made in Paris, France1927 Joan Miró, Spanish, 1893 - 1983 Oil? and graphite on canvas Currently not on view 1974-178-37 The Albert M. Greenfield and Elizabeth M. Greenfield Collection, 1974 |
ProvenanceWith Henriette Gomès, Paris, 1938 [1]; sold to Albert M. Greenfield (d. 1967) and Elizabeth M. Greenfield (later Mrs. Donald A. Petrie) (d. 2003), Philadelphia, May 16, 1956 [2]; gift to PMA, 1974. 1. According to her letter of 16 May 1956 to Albert Greenfield (copy in curatorial file), Gomès acquired the painting in 1938, without a history. However, she and her husband were close friends of Miró beginning in the 1930's: see the introduction to the sale catalogue of their library, Drouot Montaigne, Paris, "La Bibliothèque d'Henriette et André Gomes," June 18, 1997. Henriette Gomès also worked for Miró's dealer Pierre Loeb beginning in 1934, before she opened her own gallery in 1938. Miró gave André and Henriette Gomès some of his artwork on the occasion of their marriage in 1938, and they also purchased some canvases from him, so it is possible she obtained the painting directly from the artist (see interview with André Gomès by Maurice Fréchuret, in Le regard d'Henriette: collection Henriette et André Gomès, exhibition catalog, Musée Picasso d'Antibes, 1994, p. 9, 18-19). Her comment that the painting "does not have a history" may simply mean that the work had no prior owners other than Miró before she acquired it. As a Jew, she fled Paris during the Nazi occupation, and her gallery was seized as Jewish property. She and her husband were active in the French Resistance. She reopened the Galerie Henriette at 6 rue du Cirque, Paris, in 1949-50. 2. Copy of dated receipt from Gomès to Greenfield in curatorial file. |
