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''La Femme au Cheval'' (also known as ''Woman with Horse'' and ''L'Écuyère'') is a large oil painting created toward the end of 1911 by the French artist Jean Metzinger (1883–1956). The work was exhibited in Paris at the Salon des Indépendants (20 March–16 May) in 1912 and the Salon de la Section d'Or, 1912.〔(Exhibit catalog for Salon de "La Section d'Or", 1912, Jean Metzinger, ''La Femme au cheval'', p. 11, no. 116. Walter Pach papers, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution )〕 The painting was exhibited in Paris at the Salon des Indépendants of 1912. The following year ''La Femme au Cheval'' was reproduced in ''The Cubist Painters, Aesthetic Meditations'' by Guillaume Apollinaire (1913). The artist has broken down the picture plane into facets, presenting multiple aspects of the subject simultaneously. This concept first pronounced by Metzinger in 1910—since considered a founding principle of Cubism—would soon find its way into the foundations of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics; the fact that a complete description of one and the same subject may require diverse points of view which defy a unique description. The painting was owned by the poet Joseph Houot (known as Jacques Nayral). It was presumably bought by a Danish collector in 1918. The painting was subsequently sold at auction through art dealer Kai Grunth hos Winkel & Magnussen, auction no. 108, February 19, 1932, lot no. 119. Purchased by Danish physicist Niels Bohr. After his death ''Woman with Horse was sold by his widow Margrethe Bohr (through Ernest Bohr) to the Statens Museum for Kunst in Copenhagen. It is now in the Royal Collection of Paintings and Sculpture at the museum.〔(Statens Museum for Kunst (in Danish) )〕 ==Description== ''La Femme au Cheval'' is an oil painting on canvas with dimensions 162 x 130.5 cm (63.8 x 51.4 in). As the title indicates the painting represents a woman and a horse. The rather elegant woman wearing only a pearl necklace and the horse are immersed in a landscape with trees and a window (in the 'background'), a vase, with fruits and vegetation (in the 'foreground') clearly taken from the natural world. Roger Allard, in his review of the 1912 Salon des Indépendants, noted Metzinger's 'refined choice of colors' and the 'precious rarity' of the painting's 'matière'. André Salmon also noted Metzinger's 'refined use of color' in ''La Femme au Cheval'' and praised its 'French grace', while thanking Metzinger for having, for the first time, 'illuminated a cubist figure with the virtues of a smile'.〔(David Cottington, ''Cubism and Its Histories'' ), Manchester University Press, 2004〕 :"In the absence of more evidence than such brief snatches of commentary in wide-ranging salon reviews can provide, we can only speculate" writes Cottington "as to whether Metzinger intended, or its initial audience read, the provocative juxtaposition in this painting of a naked woman with horse, and of natural with cosmetic adornment, as a follow-up to ''Tea Time's'' essay on sensation and the viewer's apprehension of it."〔 :"After the clarity and measure of the demonstration piece that was ''Tea-Time''," writes Cottington, "Metzinger reprised those qualities in the large ''Woman on a Horse'', shown at the Indépendants of 1912. Through its fussy geometry we can discern a nude woman, her limbs and upper torso picked out in sensuous chiaroscuro, perched side-saddle on a studio prop-horse and stroking its mane (visible top right)..."〔 The nude woman is in fact ''not'' perched side-saddle on the horse. As others have pointed out (Antliff and Leighten),〔(Mark Antliff, Patricia Dee Leighten, ''Cubism and Culture'', Thames & Hudson, 2001 )〕 and as emerges upon close examination, the nude woman is seated on what appears to be a rectangular block or cube, perhaps a model's pedestal (visible to the left). The horse occupies the upper right-hand quadrant as if observed from above. Its head is turned toward the monumental nude while she strokes the horses right ear with her left hand. She cups her hand underneath the horses mouth, as if feeding the horse a pieces of fruit.〔 The reconstruction of the ''total image'' was left, according to Metzinger, to 'creative intuition' of the observer. While one viewer may see a woman riding a horse, another may see her sitting beside the horse, and yet others may not see a horse at all. That there even exists such ambiguity with respect to what is transpiring on the canvas is remarkable. According to the founders of Cubist theory, objects possess no absolute or essential form. "There are as many images of an object as there are eyes which look at it; there are as many essential images of it as there are minds which comprehend it."〔Jean Metzinger and Albert Gleizes, ''Du "Cubisme"'', Paris, 1912, in Robert L. Herbert, ''Modern Artists on Art'', Englewood Cliffs, 1964.〕 The nude figure sitting to the left, the horse standing to the right, along with other elements of the painting are depicted in a faceted manner, based to some extent on non-Euclidean geometry. Denying the illusion of Renaissance perspective the artist breaks down the figures and background into facets and planes, presenting multiple aspects of the subject all at once. This can be seen in the deliberate positioning of light, shadow, form and color, in the way in which Metzinger assimilates the union of the background, woman and horse. For example, the division of the model's features generates a subtle profile view, the vase is shown both from above and the side. The resulting free and mobile perspective, 'simultaneity' of multiple view-points, was used by Metzinger to constitute the image of a whole—one that includes the fourth dimension—what he called 'total image'.〔(Alex Mittelmann, ''State of the Modern Art World, The Essence of Cubism and its Evolution in Time'', Nov. 2011 )〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「La Femme au Cheval」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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