Lot 38: Fernand Leduc 1916 - Canadian oil on canvas

Fernand Leduc 1916 - Canadian oil on canvas Chromatisme binaire: violet cobalt 19 3/4 x 24 inches 50,2 x 61 centimeters signed and dated 1964 and on verso signed, titled and dated Literature:Denise LeClerc, The Crisis of Abstraction in Canada: The 1950s, 1992, page 48 Provenance:Private Collection, Montreal Fernand Leduc was one of the linking members that facilitated a transition between the Automatist and Plasticien movements in Quebec. An important artist for numerous reasons, Leduc was able to approach and unify critical themes in art abstraction that had yet to be tackled by the Automatists. The geometric style of Leduc's painting was a break from the automatic painting style that his contemporaries such as Paul-Émile Borduas were fashioning. Chromatisme binaire: violet cobalt is a product of Leduc's second period in Paris, where the influence of painter Jean Bazaine, for whom Automatist painting techniques developed from automatic writing had reached an impasse, can be seen. A key approach Bazaine espoused was the reconciliation of the experiments of modern art and Cubism with Thomist philosophy based on the teachings of Thomas Aquinas. As Denise LeClerc writes, "Leduc, a former seminarian with a philosophical bent, found himself on familiar ground here." In this richly hued painting, Leduc has progressed to a more hard-edge style of abstraction, as seen in the linear shape of the light purple crescent contrasted against the dark, expansive background.