Ivanna Lemaître (1893 Sant Petersburg - 1973 Nice), Saint Helena
Watercolor on cardboard, size 32 x 24 cm
Inscribed p.d.: S-te HeleneProvenance: Former collection of the artist's family
The works will be available for viewing on 10.12.2022 (Saturday) from 11.00 - 17.00 at the Antiquarian Art Gallery, 25 Emilii Plater Street, 00-688 Warsaw.
Biography
Ivanna Lemaître was born in St. Petersburg, Russia in 1893 and died in Nice, France in 1973. She emigrated from Russia to Paris during the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917. She studied painting and mosaic in Montmartre on Rue de la Chaumière. She married André Hubert Lemaître, a prominent fresco painter with whom she often worked, completing commissions from Parisian patrons and state commissions. Their best-known frescoes include works from the Meudon church (1927), the Marechal Lyautey salon at the 1931 Colonial Exhibition, and at the Palais de la Porte Dorée (Golden Door Palace).
During the German occupation of France during World War II, Lemaître moved to the French Riviera. She painted portraits of her friends Jean Cocteau, Andre Gide, Francois Mauriac and Serge Lifar, as well as other French writers and artists
Ivanna Lemaître is buried in the Russian cemetery in Nice, France.
Style Lemaitre executed her works using various techniques such as mosaic, ink, oil and watercolor. Her frequent subjects were villages and chapels in the countryside, views of the Mediterranean and mythology. In addition, Asian myths and religious teachings about Buddha, Krishna and Confucius. Scenes from the lives of these figures run through her works. Lemaître drew on non-Christian religions. In her paintings, she often refers to the "irreverent Orient."
Major works
1925: Recollets Convent in Toulouse
1927 : Meudon Church (faces Jean Cocteau, Jacques Maritain, etc.).
1931 : Salon Maréchal Lyautey for colonial exhibition, Porte Dorée
1935 : Frescoes for the Davout scientific group in Paris
1937 : Face of the Maroquinerie Française de l'Exposition Universelle pavilion in 1937, Paris
1937 : Maroufle canvases for the School of Fine Arts in Paris
1962 : Sanctuary of the Sacré-Coeur in Nice : monumental fresco in mosaic (50 square meters) decorating the triumphal arch
1963 : Two mosaics in tribute to Jean Médecin and Jean Cocteau at La Porte Fausse, Vieux-Nice
1965 : Mosaics for the Savings Bank in Nice
1968 : Panels in mosaics for a school in Arles
1968 : Mosaics decorating the face of the Eucalyptus gym in Nice
