Drawing of Alice Ernestine Prin, known as Kiki de Montparnasse

> This item is out of the catalogue, see available documents here <

The Queen of Montparnasse, Kiki, presents an admirer with her famous signed portrait.

Drawing created and signed by Alice Ernestine Prin, known as Kiki de Montparnasse, for an unknown admirer. In French. The drawing (7.2 cm x 9 cm) is pasted onto a sheet of paper (11.5 cm x 16 cm). Probably in France, in Paris, no information about the date. Slightly yellowed paper, excellent condition. Single piece.

Text in front (author unknown)

The famous model
Alice Ernestine Prin
Dictate Kiki
for him-même

which can be translated by:

the famous model
Alice Ernestin Prin
known as Kiki
by herself

Text on the back (author unknown)

[part of a drawing]

44 rue des Martyrs

Kiki de Montparnasse, or Kiki, pseudonym of Alice Ernestine Prin (1901-1953), was a model, muse and sometimes even lover of famous artists (Amado Modigliani, Tsugouharu Fujita, Moise Kipling, Man Ray, among others) . She was also a singer, dancer, cabaret manager, painter and film actress. He animated the Montparnasse district in Paris between the two world wars (1921-1939), in the period of artistic effervescence called Les Années Folles (The Crazy Years).

At the end of the First World War, the French are beginning to recover a taste for living peacefully after years of war and hardship. A radically new wind seems to be blowing in the country. In Paris, the Montparnasse district symbolizes this renewal, it is the time of Josephine Baker, Coco Chanel, Kiki de Montparnasse...

The first muse of great painters, Kiki de Montparnasse also began to draw portraits for British and American soldiers, conquered by this wave of creative and liberating euphoria, taking advantage of this friendly and resolutely modern atmosphere. Thereafter, he regularly exhibited his paintings in Parisian galleries.

Few drawings by Kiki de Montparnasse have survived to this day, especially in such excellent condition as this one. For those who love Paris and its immense cultural life, the 1920s are particularly important, above all for its brilliant artists, whom Kiki met and inspired with her "French sensuality": her short hair, eyes highlighted in black and lips painted in red alive made her world famous.