Decor from the ballroom of the Hôtel de Wendel (mansion)
José-Maria Sert y Badia (1874-1945)
The Catalan painter José María Sert moved to Paris in 1899 and was one of the favorite artists of Parisian society in the nineteen-twenties. An heir to the grand tradition of Italian decorative painting, he was considered in the twenties to be the greatest muralist of the 20th century. During his career, he designed over 7,000 square meters of paintings for churches and cathedrals, palaces, hotels, industrial complexes and public buildings.
Commissioned in 1925 by the Maurice and Andrée de Wendel for the ballroom of their Paris mansion located in the 9th arrondissement, this decorative and theatrical setting opens on an exotic composition of the Queen of Sheba, who dominates her court from the back of a white elephant as she leaves her kingdom to meet King Salomon. The mural makes use of all available surfaces through an ingenious treatment of space. The mural’s elaborate technique is based on sepia paint applied to metal foil, producing a very marked glazed effect that gives the entire composition a lacquered look.
Following the sale of the mansion in 1981, the decor was purchased by the Carnavalet Museum and reinstalled in 1989 in a specially designed room.