This is a superb original signed and numbered limited edition color lithograph by internationally acclaimed artist GEORGES BRAQUE (French, 1882-1963), dating from 1960.

This rare original color lithograph is entitled "Gélinotte" (Grouse) (V. 149), and is signed in pencil by the artist on the front lower right, "G. Braque".  It is also numbered in pencil on the lower left "33/75", from the total limited edition of only 75 numbered impressions. It was published/printed by Maeght/Mourlot, Paris and printed on watermarked Arches paper. It measures 18 ¾" x 25 ¾" (sheet), and is matted and framed in a silk mat and welded silver metal frame for a total size of 24 ½" x 31 ½" (there is some wear to the frame). There are two very small punctures in the lower left margin quadrant. PROVENANCE: Edward Acosta Gallery, Ltd., Beverly Hills, California; accompanied by their original receipt dated 1972. CATALOGUE REFERENCE: Vallier, Dora. Braque: The Complete Graphics, Catalogue Raisonné, W.H. Smith Publishers: New York, 1982, #149. Authenticity is GUARANTEED. Shipping is $55.00 within the US only, please email for international shipping rates. Please view my other auctions and eBay store for additional museum quality fine art and collectibles.

Georges Braque, with Pablo Picasso, was the co-founder of Cubism in 1907-8. Braque was the most consistent of the original Cubist painters and was one of the greatest painters of the century. Braque was born in Argenteuil, near Paris and brought up in Le Havre, where he was apprenticed to his father's painting trade house and studied at the local Ecole des Beaux-Arts. In 1900 he went to Paris where he befriended Raoul Dufy and Othon Friesz, also from Le Havre and studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts under Bonnat before going to the Académie Humbert between 1902 and 1904. A year later, Friesz who had adhered to the Fauvist movement notably formed by Vlaminck, Derain and Matisse invited him to adopt his style. His graphic work was connected primarily with an interest in Greek themes, which began in the 1930's and includes 16 etchings for an edition by Vollard of the Theogony of Hesiod. From 1950 to 1958 he did a series of Birds in which decorative quality is combined with extreme simplification. He began by continuing the decorative patterning and flattened planes of Synthetic Cubism but through the 1920's progressed to greater freedom and by the beginning of the 1930's was internationally hailed as a world master of still lifes of the calibre of Chardin. In 1948 Braque was awarded the Venice Biennale Grand Prix for painting. In 1951 he was made Commander of the Legion d'honneur.