Gino Severini: Danse de l’ours

GINO SEVERINI (1883-1966), Danse de l’ours, signed and dated ‘G. Severini 1913’ (lower right), oil on paper laid down on canvas, 14 3/8 x 10 5/8 in. (36.5 x 27 cm.), Painted in 1913-1914, Image Source: Christie’s

“Abandoning any trace of figuration, the artist depicts the dancing couple in a highly abstract manner, fracturing their bodies in to a series of vibrantly coloured fragments that radiate outwards from the centre of the canvas. Through this dematerialization of form, Severini aimed to create a visual representation of the energy of the performance, moving beyond a literal representation of the dancers themselves and instead focusing on the sensory impressions – the sounds, light, colours and speed – that accompanied their movements. Explaining this evolution within his painterly style, he wrote in 1913: ‘the need for abstraction and for symbols is a characteristic sign of that intensity and rapidity with which life is lived today… Things possess neither integral form nor individual outlines. Our perception bestows on objects boundaries in space, and these boundaries are the outcome, of the multiple influences of remembrance, of ambience and emotion’ (quoted in S. Fraquelli & C. Green, Gino Severini: From Futurism to Classicism, exh. cat., London, 1999, pp. 12-13).”
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