01 Work, Contemporary Interpretations of Olympian deities, Jean Souverbie's L'amazone, with footnotes #29

Jean Souverbie, 1891- 1981

L'amazone, c. 1928

Oil on canvas

60 w: 73 cm

Private collection

Sold for  €36,585 EUR in December 2019

In Greek mythology, the Amazons were a race of woman warriors.

The legendary Amazons were thought to have lived in Pontus, which is part of modern-day Turkey near the southern shore of the Black Sea. There they formed an independent kingdom under the government of a queen named Hippolyta or Hippolyte. This area is known to have been occupied in the Late Bronze Age by a transhumant group known to the Hittites as the Kaŝka; though they were not directly known to Greeks, modern archaeologists have determined that they finally defeated their enemies, the Hittites, about 1200 BC. According to Plutarch, the Amazons lived in and about the Don river, which the Greeks called the Tanais; but which was called by the Scythians the "Amazon". The Amazons later moved to Terme on the River Thermodon, northern Turkey. More on the Amazons

Jean Souverbie (French, 1891–1981) was a Figurative painter of the French school, known for his compositions of still lifes and nudes. It was a meeting with Maurice Denis and Paul Sérusier in 1908 that influenced Souverbie to take up a career as an artist. Souverbie enrolled at the Académie Ranson in 1916, where he befriended Pierre Bonnard, Edouard Vuillard, and Félix Edouard Vallotton.

Cubist tendencies were apparent in his work during the 1920s as a result of his contact with the work of Georges Braque. However, his sensuousness allowed him to combine a Cubist vocabulary with a more traditional naturalism in order to create his voluptuous, classical nudes. 

In 1925, Souverbie was under contract with the Galerie Vavin-Raspail, which hosted the Section d'Or exhibition that year, bringing him into contact with many other members of the Parisian avant-garde. After his first solo show at Vavin-Raspail in 1926, Souverbie went on to have a show of 54 Cubist paintings at the Bernheim-Jeune Gallery in 1929, which solidified his reputation as an important figure in the Parisian art scene of the 1920s and 1930s. More ob Jean Souverbie

Please visit my other blogs: Art Collector, Mythology, Marine Art, Portrait of a Lady, The Orientalist, Art of the Nude and The Canals of Venice, Middle East Artists, 365 Saints, 365 Days, and Biblical Icons, also visit my Boards on Pinterest

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