Beschreibung:

Pavel Tchelitchew (Russian/American, 1898-1957) Chicos con ropa tendida Signed and dated "P tchelitchew 1939" l.l., identified on a label from Swetzoff Gallery, Boston, affixed to the backing. Ink on paper, sight size 10 1/2 x 7 7/8 in. (26.6 x 19.8 cm), framed. Condition: Toning, not examined out of frame. Literature: Pavel Tchelitchew Pinturas y Dibujos 1925-1948, Instituto de Arte Moderno, Buenos Aires, Argentina, August 1949, p. 24 (illustrated plate no. 33). Exhibitions: Buenos Aires, Instituto de Arte Moderno, Pavel Tchelitchew August 15 to September 10, 1949, no. 40. N.B. We wish to thank Erik La Prade for his kind assistance with cataloguing the lot. In 1944, the poet and critic, Parker Tyler, published a book-length poem, Yesterday's Children. The poem was illustrated by Pavel Tchelitchew with 29 full-length, black-and-white drawings. The drawings were created between 1939 and 1940, at the height of Tchelitchew's creative powers. The central figures in these drawings are children at play, either fighting among themselves with wheat stalks, or wrapped in and camouflaged by oak leaves, they explore the surrounding forest. Tchelitchew's drawings have beautifully captured the central theme of the poem, which is the transient nature of childhood. This particular drawing was not included in Tyler's book yet it appears to be an early study for a drawing done in 1940, which does appear in the book and is sometimes known as The Clothes Line.