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Artist or Maker: Vanessa Bell (1879-1961)

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Description: La Bergère, Cassis
signed and dated 'V. Bell/1930' (lower left)
oil on board
18 x 15 in. (45.7 x 38.1 cm.)

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Provenance: with Lefevre Gallery, London.
Mrs Sylvia Twomb, London.

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Exhibited: London, Agnews, Recent Pictures by Duncan Grant, Vanessa Bell & Keith Baynes, June - July 1932, no. 8, as 'The Farmhouse, Cassis'.

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Published: J. Marsh, Bloomsbury Women, London, 1995, pl. 81.

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Notes: VARIOUS PROPERTIES

'La Bergère' or 'The Shepherdess' was a small, disused farmworker's cottage that Vanessa Bell discovered in 1927 on a trip to Cassis. She took on a ten-year lease intending to use the house for painting trips to the area. (see F. Spalding, Vanessa Bell, London, 1983, p. 217).

It was situated not far from Villa Corsica, a house that they had previously rented in Cassis, 'Looking down across the fields towards Cassis, was an uninhabited workman's cottage. It was exactly what Duncan had hoped for. I have taken a cottage on his (Teed's) estate to be turned into a studio', he told Eddy [Sackville-West]. 'It is in a most heavenly position. In a "classical" landscape some way from the town or village' (see F. Spalding, Duncan Grant A biography, London, 1997, p. 279).

We are very grateful to Richard Shone for his assistance in preparing the catalogue entries for lots 156-161.

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