Landscape with trees

Medium: Original drawing with black and green ink, Estate stamped lower right “dm 1998”, signed by the artist in black ink, top right
Size: 315 X 240 mms
Reference: Unknown.
Biographical Note: Henriette Theodora Markovitch alias Dora Maar was a French photographer and painter of Croatian descent, best known for being a lover and muse of Pablo Picasso. She was born in Tours, Western France, on November 22.1907 and died, 89 years of age, in Paris on July 16.1997. Her father was Croatian and her mother was born in Tourraine, France. Dora grew up in Argentina. Picasso met her in January 1936 at the terrace of the Café “Les Deux Magots” in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, Paris. The famous poet Paul Eluard, who accompanied him, had to introduce him to this beautiful woman. Their relationship lasted nearly nine years until Picasso moved on. Dora Maar became the rival of Marie-Thérèse Walter who had a daughter named Maya with Picasso. Picasso often painted Dora (she suffered because she and called her his «Private Muse. » Dora did suffer from depression and Picasso made many portraits of the “Weeping woman” with her as a subject. Picasso ultimately treated Dora very badly and she never really recovered emotionally from the relationship which ended in 1943.
Provenance 1: After Dora’s death in 1997 there were a series of auctions at the Hotel Druout in which her effects were sold. The mementoes of the time when she was close to Picasso went for very large sums. At the same series of auctions, however, were a number of small drawings by Dora of which this is one. It is marked with the sale stamp “dm 1998” in an oval.
Provenance 2: Paris Art Dealer.
Note: The subject of the drawing is very typical of Dora’s work with a delicate pointialism contrasting the black and the green inks. It is difficult to know at what date it might have been made but probably from the 1950’s or 60’s.