Provenance:          Neal Adair Prince Trust u/a/d 10.18.1999

Mr. Neal Prince

Mr. Neal Prince and Mr. Herbert Waide Hemphill, Jr.

The New Gallery, 601 Madison Avenue, New York, New York.

The first Label on the back of the artwork states “The New Gallery” is located on the back of the item.

The Second Label attached on the back of this item which stamped, “Smith College Museum of Art Loan 43:39. Artist: Serge Ferat, Title: Still Life, No. 3297.38, Lender: Putzel”.

The Third Label states as follows: “The New Gallery, 601 Madison Avenue, New York; Artist: Serge Ferat, Date 1881-, Title: Still Life with Guitar (1914), Medium: Gouache, Price: N/A, Size: 9-1/4” x 9”.

The Fourth Identification on the back would be a black stamp, with a word located within the upper inner half of the circle states: “938AD_ _” and the word “EXPOSITION” stamped on the lower half of the circle. In the middle would be the word “PARIS” stamped on a horizontal level in the middle of the stamp. 

The Fifth Identification on the back of the item would be a written crayon mark stating the following: “Ferat 05/13/153”

Serge Ferat (1881-1958), Russian

Mr. Ferat was born in 1881 and was a Russian Cubist Artist. Also known as Serge Jastrebzoff (also spelled Sergey Yastrebzow) was the second son of the Moscow-born Russian count Jastrebzoff. (His date of birth differs in various publications). As a child, he visited England, France, Italy and Germany with his family. In 1901, Serge came to Paris along with Helene d'Oettingen, who was purportedly his father's mistress, and went to study at the Academie Julian. Serge painted under the name Alexander Rudniev and later under the name Serge Ferat. As of 1906, he held regular exhibitions at the Salon des Independants. In Paris he met Picasso and Apollinaire. He and Helene d'Oettingen took over Les Soirees de Paris for 200 francs (ORIGINAL TEXT SAYS 200 HUNDRED FRANCS) from them, a publication for the Parisian avant-garde. After not having appeared for five months, they released an illustrated number 18 in November 1918. This number contained four works by Picasso. Serge and Helene's apartment on the seventh floor of Boulevard Raspail 229 became a meeting place. Serge started painting cubistically, mainly on glass. Presumably, Picasso started to experiment on glass due to Serge. Picasso left parts of the glass unpainted, resulting in the background playing with the painting. Only "Violin and newspaper" has been preserved. After the First World War broke out, Serge Ferat started to work as a volunteer at the Hospital du Gouvernement Italien in Paris. When Picasso's wife Eva was in this hospital in February 1915, Picasso stayed with Helene d'Oettingen and Ferat. Picasso could use their telephone and also learned Russian. During that time, Serge had a relationship with Irene Lagut, who he later lost to Picasso. Later, Apollinaire wrote about this period the novel "La femme assise", which was not published until 1920. When Apollinaire got wounded on March 17th 1917, Serge Ferat made sure he got admitted to the Hopital du Gouvernment Italien in Paris. Shortly afterwards, Apollinaire started showing the first symptoms of paralyzation. A brain operation on May 9th 1917 got rid of these symptoms. As a result of the Russian Revolution, the flow of income from Russia stopped. After selling works by Rousseau le Douanier, Serge started working mainly for theaters. Among others, Ferat designed the set for Les Mamelles de Tiresias, a surreal play by Apollinaire in 1918. Irene Lagut designed the costumes for this play. Serge Ferat exhibited his works with the cubists during Section d'Or in 1925. He died in Paris in 1958. Helene d'Oettingen wrote poems under the name Leonard Pieux and novels under the name Roch Grey. She painted under the name Francois Angiboult.