Laurence Vail
Untitled Bottles, circa 1942
Collaged glass bottles
8 3/4 x 5 inches, 12 1/4 x 3 3/4 inches
Provenance
The artist
Art of the Century, New York
Dwight Ripley
Estate of Dwight Ripley
By Descent, New York
Acquired from the above, 2025
Exhibited
New York, Art of This Century, Laurence Vail: Bottles, December 1942.
Greenwich, CT, Bruce Museum, Connecticut Modern: Art, Design and the Avant-Garde, 1930-1960, September 23, 2023-January 7, 2024.
Literature
Susan Davidson, Peggy Guggenheim and Frederick Kiesler: The Story of Art of This Century, Guggenheim Museum Publications, 2004, p. 319-320.
Laurence Vail was born in Paris on January 28, 1891, to American parents. His father, Eugène Vail, was a painter, renowned for his depictions of Brittany and Venice. For many years throughout his childhood, Vail accompanied his father on his travels to Venice. Having initially studied in France, he moved to England to study literature at Oxford University. Upon his return to Paris, he devoted himself to writing plays and essays, translating books from French, painting, sculpting, and creating collages. In the late 1920s he was considered a main figure of Paris's flourishing intellectual and social circles, to the extent that he became known as the "King of Bohemia." He associated with writers and artists, including Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray, who crowded the cafes of Montparnasse.
In 1922 he married Peggy Guggenheim, who was, in his eyes, a young woman to whom he could teach art, life, and literature. After the birth of their first son, Sindbad, the couple travelled to Italy and Egypt. In 1926 they went to Switzerland, where their second child, Pegeen, was born. The family settled in Pramousquier in the south of France, where Vail started writing the novel Murder! Murder!, a cutting satire about his marriage, published in 1932. He also continued to paint, creating a series of works which were exhibited for the first time in 1926 at the Parisian boutique on the rue du Colisée managed by Guggenheim and her business partner, Mina Loy...
Category
1940s Dada Paper Sculptures
MaterialsGlass, Paper, Mixed Media
