CHAGALL, Marc

Sarah and the Angels by Marc Chagall

Description

A colour lithograph by Marc Chagall. The image is titled ‘Sarah and  the Angels’, as published in his famous ’The Bible’. Published as part of the series ‘Verve 33/34’, the prints were printed by Mourlot in Paris in 1960. It is a limited but unsigned edition. The work bears an additional Black and White Lithograph on the reverse.
Reference: Chagall: The Lithographs: Catalogue Raisonne, by Charles Sorlier and Fernand Mourlot.
Reference: M. 244

Size  355 x 260mm   (14 x 10 inches)

Long influenced by his Jewish and religious upbringing, in the spring of 1931, Marc Chagall traveled to the Holy Land and upon his return started creating his The Bible series in 1931-1939.  However, the onset of the Second World War postponed the series for twenty five years until he returned to it in 1952-56. The first series  comprised of two volumes and 105 etchings. His second series, is the series titled ‘Drawings for the Bible’ which comprised of 24 colour lithographs illustrating tales from the Bible that was published by Verve, Paris and printed by Mourlot, Paris from 1958-1960.

The inspiration for Marc Chagall’s Drawings for the Bible was not just from his visit to the Holy Land, but from his own childhood in Russia as well. In Marc Chagall: The Graphic Works, Chagall’s biographer Franz Meyer states, “Chagall’s ties with the Bible are very deep indeed; the forms that people its (the Bible’s) world are a part of his own inner life, part of the living Jewish heritage, and thus are archetypes of a greater, more intensive world.”