Fernand Léger and the rooftops of Paris

Turning point

When Fernand Léger (1881-1955) paints the series Fumées sur les toits in 1911-1912, he finds himself at a turning point in his career. From 1908 he makes a radical departure from the style of his earlier works, initially heavily inspired by Paul Cézanne, in search of new artistic possibilities. The view from his studio over the roofs of Paris, with its chimneys and plumes of smoke, inspires Léger to experiment with form and colour, working from relatively realistic and monochrome towards increasingly abstract and colourful.

###Hidden painting### The centrepiece of the exhibition is a newly discovered painting from this series. The painting appears on the reverse of Léger’s Le quatorze juillet, which was acquired by the Triton Collection Foundation in 1999. The Fumées sur les toits painting was revealed during recent conservation work.

Development

On the basis of paintings and drawings, Fernand Léger and the rooftops of Paris shows his development. The broader context is formed by the works of the two groups of cubists in Paris: Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque who exhibited mainly in the gallery of Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler, and the group around Léger, which exhibited at the major Salons and also included Robert Delaunay, Jean Metzinger and Henri Le Fauconnier.