A New York gallery, a merchant and an agent.
“I do not want Picasso because I don’t know who to sell them too (sic),” Valentine Dudensing hastily wrote to Pierre Matisse in early November 1928.[i] In his role as the Paris-based agent for the F. Valentine Dudensing Gallery, Pierre Matisse (1900–1989) scouted for artwork in galleries, auctions, and artists’ studios for Dudensing (1892–1967) to sell in New York. During the nearly five years that they worked together the two men communicated through a constant stream of letters and telegrams with Dudensing reporting on his latest sales and giving directives in response to Matisse’s proposals and suggestions. At the time that he wrote these words to Matisse—almost three years after he opened his gallery—Dudensing had not yet sold a single work by Picasso.
Within weeks however Dudensing was on his way to becoming the most important dealer of Picasso’s work in New York. In early December 1928 he sold a 1906 gouache, Woman with Kerchief [Z.I,319], to New York attorney and collector T. Catesby Jones.[ii] This work was the first of nearly 200 by Picasso that Dudensing would sell during the two decades that the gallery—later known simply as the Valentine Gallery—was in business.[iii] Throughout the 1930s Picasso dominated the gallery’s sales records; Dudensing sold more works by him than any other European artist and did much to promote and establish his reputation in this country. He included Picasso’s paintings and drawings in numerous group exhibitions over the years and mounted seven solo exhibitions between 1931 and 1939. In May 1939 the Valentine Gallery was the first stop on the U.S. tour of Guernica along with a group of approximately sixty related drawings.
[i] Letter from Valentine Dudensing to Pierre Matisse, November 6, 1928, Pierre Matisse Gallery Archives, MA5020, Box 89, Folder 29, Department of Literary and Historical Manuscripts, The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, N.Y.
[ii] Valentine Dudensing Ledger Books, vol. II: January 1926-February 1931, p. 149. The Museum of Modern Art Archives, New York. The Valentine Gallery ledger books were an important source of information for this article.
[iii] This number refers to paintings and original works on paper.
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