Christopher Wood (British, 1901-1930) Portrait of a Young Man oil on canvas 41.2 x 33.6 cm. (16 1/4 x 13 1/4 in.) Painted in 1927 Footnotes: Provenance P.H.B. Burton With Mercury Gallery, London, 28 June 1977, where purchased by the family of the present owner Private Collection, U.K. Exhibited London, The New Burlington Galleries, Christopher Wood: Exhibition of Complete Works, 3 March-2 April 1938, cat.no.249 London, Mercury Gallery, Christopher Wood: Paintings, Watercolours, Drawings, 29 June-23 July 1977, cat.no.6, exh.no.201 Literature Eric Newton, Christopher Wood 1901-1930, The Redfern Gallery, London, 1938, p.70, cat.no.249 In 1927 Christopher Wood left London and returned to Paris where he moved into Tony Gandarillas' new Passy apartment. It was a tough time for the artist who was dissatisfied with much of his recent work, which was predominantly a mixture of still life, landscape views of the Passy streets and the River Seine. However, it was also at this point that he completed one of his finest works, the almost life-size Self-Portrait (Kettle's Yard, University of Cambridge) that oozes with self-confidence and illustrates the artist as a young man, standing on the balcony, holding a paintbrush and with a background of houses amidst a captivating Prussian blue sky. The only other portrait listed in Eric Newton's 1938 literature on the artist from this year is the present work, Portrait of a Young Man. Like the aforementioned Self-portrait, which was likely painted earlier in the year, it is a confident example which no doubt depicts an attractive member of Wood and Gandarillas' male circle. The head and shoulders of the sitter dominate the canvas with little room for anything other than the intriguing background, which with its moody sky and formation of clouds gives no clue of specific location but hints at Surrealism. Wood's use of the dark palette is characteristic of his time spent in Vence later in the year where he was nursing his friend René Crevel, a member of the Surrealist movement, and inspired to paint darker landscapes that were influenced by Van Gogh's paintings of St Rémy. For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com