Following her first major United States retrospective at San Francisco’s De Young museum, moving to The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, on March 9, and just shy of one year after the close of the lauded Broadway musical about her life, Polish-born Art Deco painter Tamara de Lempicka (1894-1980) remains in the limelight. Lempicka’s Portrait du Docteur Boucard (1928) is a highly-anticipated lot in Christie’s upcoming 20th/21st Century: London evening sale on March 5, expected to fetch up to $10 million. Here’s what collectors and fans alike should know before the sale.
Tamara de Lempicka’s Portrait du Docteur Boucard.
A painter who worked between France and the US, Tamara de Lempicka (née Tamara Rosalia Gurwik-Gorska) was born in Warsaw, Poland, in 1898. She fled to Paris at the start of the Russian Revolution and to the US at the start of World War II. She studied art under the influence of Maurice Denis and André Lhote and took her well-to-do social circle, which included Vita Sackville-West and the French novelist Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette, as her subjects.
A Tamara de Lempicka painting in a home in Aspen, with interior design by Patrick Mele.
Coming from an important private collection, Portrait du Docteur Boucard was commissioned from Lempicka by the sitter himself, Doctor Boucard, a prominent art collector and patron of the artist. It was with Boucard’s generous financial support that Lempicka was able to establish a studio on Rue Méchain in Paris, designed by modernist architect Robert Mallet-Stevens.
The artwork evidences her talent for blending identity with broader social and historical themes, juxtaposing her signature smooth, sculptural figuration against a cubist backdrop. This rare Art Deco gem hasn’t been seen on the market in the past forty years, so mark your calendars—and long live Lempicka-mania!
Sean Santiago is ELLE Decor’s Deputy Editor, covering news, trends and talents in interior design, hospitality and travel, culture, and luxury shopping. Since starting his career at an interior design firm in 2011, he has gone on to cover the industry for Vogue, Architectural Digest, Sight Unseen, PIN-UP and Domino. He is the author of The Lonny Home (Weldon Owens, 2018), has produced scripted social content for brands including West Elm and Streeteasy, and is sometimes recognized on the street for his Instagram Reels series, #DanceToDecor
