18. FRANCIS PICABIA (1879-1953) Salaganes signed 'Francis Picabia' (lower right); inscribed 'Salaganes' (upper left) oil on canvas Painted circa 1932 55 x 65.5 cm. The authenticity of this work has been confirmed by the Picabia Committee. Provenance Daniel Martin Collection. Private collection, Paris (acquired from it in 1946). Private collection, Paris (by descent in 1995). Private collection, Paris (by descent in 2008). Bibliography B. Calté, W.A. Camfield, C. Clements & A. Pierre, Francis Picabia: Catalogue Raisonné, vol. III, 1927-1939, Brussels, 2019, no. 1246, (illustrated p. 287). The 1930s were a pivotal period in Francis Picabia's artistic career. After having been one of the great instigators of the Dada movement, a major figure in the international avant-garde and a provocateur of genius, Picabia made a stylistic shift that was as radical as it was fascinating. He moved away from the mechanical and abstract experiments of the previous decade to devote himself to a series of enigmatic and poetic works: the "Transparencies". This new phase, begun in the late 1920s but fully developed in the 1930s, reflected a desire for a synthesis between figuration, symbolism and spirituality. In his canvases, Picabia superimposed images borrowed from a variety of sources - photographs, old paintings, classical sculptures - in a complex, fluid composition in which the forms seemed to float through one another. These diaphanous figures, often female, cross paths without colliding, creating visual effects akin to dreams or inner vision. Through their dreamlike nature, their symbolic ambiguity and their openness to the unconscious, "Transparences" resonate with the world of Surrealism. There is an aesthetic of mystery, a logic of free association, and an attention to the psychic dimension of the image. However, Picabia never formally joined the Surrealist movement. True to his position as an independent and irreverent artist, he kept his distance from manifestos and dogmas, preferring total freedom of expression. A famous anecdote illustrates this rebellious and irreverent spirit: one day, when Paul Éluard tried to persuade him to sign a collective text for the Surrealist group, Picabia replied, amused: "I'd rather sign a blank cheque. A scathing retort that perfectly sums up his refusal to accept any orthodoxy, even among the most radical avant-gardes. Based in Paris, but also often in Mougins on the Côte d'Azur, Picabia developed a deeply personal body of work, at odds with the artistic conventions of the time. The "Transparences" are both a culmination of his earlier research and a singular response to the uncertainties of the time: the rise of political tensions, post-Dada disenchantment, and the quest for a new pictorial language. With their plastic finesse and symbolic depth, these works occupy a unique place in the history of modern - and can we say surrealist - painting. They bear witness to Picabia's ability to reinvent himself, true to himself in his refusal to be classified, and in his tireless quest for a free, interior and living art. The salanganes - and not Salaganes, a mistake in French that we can't hold against the Spanish artist Picabia - are fast, elusive migratory birds that move through the air with great agility. This motif evokes a form of pure freedom, vital élan and inner movement - all values dear to Picabia at the time, when he was seeking to go beyond the materialism of the mechanical avant-garde to explore more intuitive, psychic and spiritual areas. This Theme reveals a taste for rare, exotic, slightly melancholy visual poetry. The bird becomes a metaphor for the creative gesture, free, fluid and elusive - just like the artist himself. The bird's strong presence accentuates the idea of superimposed planes, fleeting visions, passages from one world to another; an aspect akin to dreams, the subconscious, in dialogue with Surrealist preoccupations, without being totally subservient to them. This elusive bird twirls through the two old men as they face up to the passage of time, age, old age and, by extension, eternal youth. This work, never before seen on the market, is a perfect example, if not the most striking, of Picabia's evolution, freedom and emancipation from a stylistic, dreamlike and ultimately surrealist point of view.