Ensemble de 11 vues photographiques originales autour de l'atelier de Nicolas de Staël

Set of 11 original photographs of Nicolas de Staël's studio by Denise Colomb, in period printing.

Small fold marks at the corners of some photographs.

Superb views of the building housing the painter's studio, at 7 rue Gauguet in Paris, taken one year before his tragic end. The cracked and textured walls bear a striking resemblance to his "brushed, indeed masoned painting" (Marcelin Pleynet and Michel Seuphor), those knife-applied impastos that had considerable influence on abstract painting in the second half of the century.

The photographs were taken by Denise Colomb, great portraitist of the 20th century, who immortalized Antonin Artaud, and created spectacular views of the studios of Giacometti, Picasso, Soulages and Miro.

"They say his studio was a paleontological potter's cave. With sediments, paleolithic layers... A crucible, a great material well, riddled with pigments, brushes, pots of plastered trowels, buckets, rags. In a strong smell of turpentine. A studio gorged, soiled, plumed with grime, the pastes of masonry. His span, his strength, his topgallant height soar in this Vesuvius crater. Slightly off course, he leans, he pours. To paint, for him, is to be prey to vertigo, to unpredictable bifurcations of accident, of chance." (Patrick Grainville, Les Yeux de Milos).