Rare furniture decoration project (table top) (pencil, pastel and chalk) by Karin Van Leyden* representing a mythological scene with Apollo and the nymph Daphne***, most likely collaboration of Karin with the designer Paul Laszlo**, from the 1940s 20th century.

This project is in good general condition, in its original condition. Signed on one side.

Please note: some stains, yellowing, folds and wear from time, take a good look at the photos.

We are putting other projects of Karin for sale on this site.

*** In Greek mythology, Daphne is a nymph of great beauty, daughter of the river god Peneus. His legend is notably reported in Ovid's Metamorphoses: to take revenge on Apollo, who mocked him, Cupid, god of Love, simultaneously shoots two arrows, one, made of gold, at the god himself, which makes him madly in love with the beautiful Daphne, the other, made of lead, at the nymph, which inspires in him a disgust for love. As Apollo pursues her, she, exhausted, asks her father, the river god Peneus, to come to her aid: he transforms his daughter into an oleander (in Greek rhododaphne). Apollo, who is still in love with her, then makes it his tree, and dedicates it to triumphs, songs and poems.

** Paul László

or Paul Laszlo in its anglicized form (1900-1993) was a Hungarian and American architect, interior designer and furniture designer. He is considered one of the greatest furniture and interior designers of the 20th century. László built his reputation designing home interiors but during the 1960s he moved into shop interior design and commercial furniture.
During the 1940s and 1950s, Laszlo often commissioned Karin Van Leyden to design tables, lighting and even panels and murals for many of his projects. Always using glass as a medium and often signing his works “Bottega Karin” or a variation of his signature (Van Leyden).

* Karin van Leyden:

painter, born Kluth (1906-1977). She married the Dutch painter Ernst van Leyden (1892-969) in 1932 (their son Ragnar, who would have a career in film editing, was born the same year). Figurative experimenting with abstraction from 1953, she signed her paintings "Karin".
From 1925 to 1927, Karin was a student at the Cologne School of Fine Arts. She met Ernst van Leyden, close to Piet Mondrian, Theo van Doesburg and Willem de Kooning, with whom she travelled through Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Italy before enrolling in mural painting courses given by Professor Chigi at the Academy of Florence.
With Ernst, she divided her time between the banks of Lake Loosdrecht (Netherlands) and Paris, where she frequented the circles of writers and artists (Marc Chagall, Jules Pascin, Tsoguharu Foujita, Ossip Zadkine, Giorgio de Chirico, Francis Picabia, Christian Bérard and Man Ray). The latter makes a superb portrait photo of her. After their marriage in 1932, Karin and Ernst van Leyden settled in Cintra (Portugal) for three years. In 1936 they lived for a time in Capri (Italy) before arriving in London. The large murals she executed at Hatherop Castle earned her an honorary distinction. World War II forced them to emigrate to the United States. They set up their studio in New York, then in Nyack, then discovering the West Coast, they decided to live there and bought a ranch in Hollywood to set up their studio there. Frequenting a circle of writers, painters, musicians and cinema personalities (Aldous Huxley, Thomas Mann, Henry Miller, Bertolt Brecht, Salvador Dalí, Igor Stravinsky, Arnold Schönberg, Arthur Rubinstein, Charles Laughton, Charlie Chaplin), also meeting Max Ernst and the architects Eric Mendelsohn and Frank Lloyd Wright, Karin built up a reputation there, becoming a portraitist and painter of murals for the villas of "All Hollywood". The couple made several trips to Mexico where Karin discovered Indian culture in Chiapas. Friendships were formed in Mexico with José Clemente Orozco and Diego Rivera, whose portraits she painted. Karin's Mexican period tinges her figurative art with a cubist influence. Karin also became known on both sides of the Atlantic as a designer, designing furniture projects for interior designer Paul László, advertisements and designs for Kathleen Mary Quinlan, Jovoy-Corday and Harper's Bazaar. From 1947, Karin and Ernst van Leyden set up a studio in Paris. Finally, they acquired a ruin called "L'enclos du Lieutel" near Montfort-l'Amaury to transform it into a residence-workshop. After 1955, the couple continued their stays abroad (Venice and New York), but a divergence of sensibilities became apparent: Karin enjoyed working in Rome, Ernst preferred his "enclosure" in Montfort-l'Amaury where he would settle permanently in 1962. The distance is created, Karin then turns towards abstraction and the meetings, until the death of Ernst van Leyden in 1969, will no longer be only occasionally, in New York in particular, where Karin will continue to return regularly. Alone in the evening of her life, Karin chose to live in Lugano, not far from her younger sister Charlotte Kluth.

Very highly rated artist on ArtPrice.

Dimensions : approx. 100 cm x 60 cm

Reference : 920 338