Amedeo Modigliani · PD
Maurice Drouard
Details
The story
The sitter is Maurice Drouard, a sculptor, born in Paris in 1886. He and Modigliani knew each other from 7 rue du Delta, a dilapidated house below Montmartre that a young doctor named Paul Alexandre and his brother rented so that artists could work and sleep there. Alexandre was the first person to buy Modigliani's work and for years almost the only one.
1909 is also the year Modigliani began moving toward sculpture. He left the Delta house for a studio in Montparnasse, and from 1910 he spent most of his time cutting stone, so painted portraits of these friends grow scarce.
Drouard was mobilised in August 1914 and killed at Sommepy in Champagne on 29 September 1915, while he was helping the wounded. He was 29, and left behind 183 drawings and 75 sculptures. The painting is in a private collection.
