LÉONARD TSUGUHARU FOUJITA (1886-1968) TWO YOUNG WOMEN IN A LANDSCAPE, CIRCA 1918 Gouache, watercolour, ink and gold leaf on paper Signed lower right Countersigned and situated in Japanese "À Paris, Foujita" lower right Gouache, watercolour, ink and gold leaf on paper; signed lower right; signed again and located in Japanese lower right 42 X 28,5 CM - 16 1/2 X 11 1/4 IN. A certificate from Madame Sylvie Buisson, dated 27 January 2025, will be given to the buyer. PROVENANCE Private collection, France. Foujita had the art of merging worlds. The East and the West intertwine in his work, particularly in this gouache, sublimated by the reflections of a majestically patinated gold. The crossbreeding impulse that drives the painter, and belongs to him alone, demonstrates his erudition and enlightened humanism through a subject as seemingly insignificant as this one. Nothing could be more trivial than the contemplation of two tiny flowers that have just opened by two women, one placing her hand on the shoulder of the other who is pointing her hand towards the ground, and yet a whole philosophy of life emanates from this pause in contemplation. In reality, this is first and foremost a disguised self-portrait by Foujita, who is embarking on a meditation on the impermanence of life. Through an allegory, it is an invitation to consider the perspective of time as it passes, as the great Ronsard so aptly put it: "Mignonne allons voir si la rose.... Pick, pick your youth : Comme à ceste fleur la vieillesse Will tarnish your beauty. Here, Foujita divides himself into two graceful persons. In disguise, he recalls his fate as a fragile, worried artist who, in the midst of the Second World War, was enjoying success while the cannon was still firing east of Paris. Drawing on his vocabulary of forms from East and West, he transcends, magnifies and appropriates a central existential subject, embodying it in frail, angelic female figures that are at once so palpable that they keep him alive on tiptoe. Because he knows everything there is to know about Japanese art, his brush obeys the rigour of the calligraphic gesture with unprecedented precision. Each stroke, drawn by hand without prior sketch, is an expression of the vital breath known in Japan as "Ki". Of life itself. Of life stronger than death. Here, Foujita is at once the fragility of a flower, the grace of a Yoshiwara geisha, a 16th-century Florentine Botticellian, and, in all simplicity, a Byzantine virgin. Knees slightly bent, head bowed in humility and contemplation, he prays. But he wouldn't be the rebel painter that Paris praises if he didn't add his own touch of modernity and eccentricity to these fused women, creating transparent, body-hugging garments that defy all time and civilisation codes. The previous year, he had been the star designer at Selfridge in London. Foujita's transgressions make him unique: they are in the details. Here we are in Japan, Florence and Montparnasse all at the same time, where these cosmopolitan muses with their mixed features, whom he posed for and adored, surrounded him; he could not do without them. Here we have Jeanne H., on the left, and his wife Fernande B., on the right. Or Hanka Z., Lunia C., Kiki, Aïcha... and others. Foujita was an unconditional worshipper of women. He sublimated her. She illuminated his own image. He studied them in the Louvre by Botticelli, Simone Martini, Filippino Lippi... He also extracted grace, strength and refinement from them in Japan by Kitagawa Utamaro, Katsushika Hokusai, Utagawa Kuniyoshi, Toshusai Sharaku. Thanks to them in particular, he has created an eternal bridge between worlds that seem to be at odds. One woman's blond hair waves in Florence, the other's veil in Siena. The slender, elongated noses, almond-shaped slit eyes and tiny mouths are also reminiscent of African and Oceanian ritual masks, Japanese Noh theatre masks and Modigliani's close friend. The mannerist posture of the women, the movement of their arms, their long hands and their bent heads all contribute to an architectural setting in which they become the keystone of a sacred space. Delicate gold leaves outline the celestial vault like an icon. They are invitations to contemplation, prayer and the silence of mystical meditation. Gold was used everywhere in Byzantium, Italy, Japan and the West to represent God, and here Foujita combines it with the black smoke of the candles, which reinforces and nourishes his nascent mysticism. Foujita's gouache, charged with meaning and beauty, echoes both the women of Montparnasse, the enchantresses of his favourite district, of his open-air temple, and those of whom he is the erudite and believing inventor, for eternity. The art of merging worlds Sylvie Buisson, expert and editor of the Catalogue Général Raisonné of the Works of Léonard Foujita. Virgin Mary - Byzantine, mosaic, 11th century, Sainte-Sophie Cathedral, Kiev, Ukraine. Simone Memmi de Sienne, known as "Simone Martini" (1284-1344) Annunciation, 1333 (Detail from the polyptych). Tempera on panel, 23.5 x 14.5 cm, Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp (Belgium). Alessandro Filipepi, known as "Botticelli" and Filippino Lippi (1457-1504) The Return of Judith to Bethulia, (1469-1470) Tempera on wood, Cincinnati Art Museum, John J. Emery Fonds.