Romain de TIRTOFF dit ERTÉ (1892 - 1990) - Lot 161

Romain de TIRTOFF dit ERTÉ (1892 - 1990) Rose Marie, dancer with flowers, orange, yellow, white and black costume. Gouache, signed lower middle and numbered N 16-186 on the back. 37.5 x 27.5 cm. ATELIER ERTÉ, three gouache transfers of the same subject, numbered N 16.186 on the back, one identified top left. 37.5 x 26.5 cm. Sylvie Maurisset, in the Drouot sale catalog of May 13, 1992, states: "The crossed-out N followed by Erté's autograph number (...) corresponds to his own chronology of creation recorded in his personal notebook". Erté, whose real name is Roman Petrovitch Tyrtov, was born in St. Petersburg into a family steeped in art and culture. From an early age, he showed precocious artistic talent, designing his first costume at the age of five. His mother, an elegant and refined woman, deeply inspired him, and is the source of his aesthetic of the woman who is at once fatal, "liana" or "sinuous". As a child, his interest in fashion was fueled by the Russian and Parisian fashion magazines his mother read. At the age of fifteen, he moved to Paris, where he began working under the pseudonym Erté (R (er) for the initial of his first name T (té) for that of his last name). He also took up sculpture, creating an Art Nouveau-style silver-plated bronze, La Demoiselle à la balancelle. Demoiselle à la balancelle. In 1910, Erté moved to Paris, then to Boulogne-sur-Seine. The following year, he attended the Académie Julian while working on his fashion designs. His debut was marked by set design for Paul Poiret's Oriental dress collections, and in 3, for the Théâtre de la Renaissance in Paris for the play Le Minaret, directed by Jacques Richepin and starring the famous Mata Hari. His career took off and he began working for La Gazette du Bon Ton. In 1915, he signed his first major contract with Harper's Bazaar, the magazine that launched his career and for which he produced over two hundred and forty covers. After a stay in the USA (1925-1928), where he had signed a contract with Metro Goldwin Mayer, he designed costumes and sets for such memorable productions as the Ziegfeld Follies, the film Paris by Louis B. Mayer's Paris, King Vidor's King Vidor's La Bohème and Ben Hur.... Returning to Paris in the 30s, he worked on costumes for the Folies Bergère revues. After the Second World War, he worked mainly creating sets and costumes for Parisian cabarets, the Moulin Rouge, the Folies Bergère dressing Mistinguett, Joséphine Baker and Zizi Jeanmaire. A tireless worker, he returned to sculpture in the 60s and continued to create jewelry and objets d'art in the 90s. Erté died in Paris in 1990, leaving behind him a lasting legacy as a creative visionary and pioneer of 20th-century design. twentieth century