Pierre Ernest Kohl: A Monegasque in Montparnasse

A few sweeping charcoal lines, a wash of warm sepia, a touch of yellow and blue: a seated model seen from behind, her weight on one arm, drawn quickly from life in 1925. It has the freedom of the Paris academies of the twenties because that is exactly where it was made. Pierre Ernest Kohl (1897–1985) is lot 26 of our Modern Masters: 20th Century Art sale.

Refusing the family business

Kohl was born in Monaco on 3 February 1897, the son of a prosperous entrepreneur who expected him to take over the firm. He chose painting instead and entered the Académie de la Grande Chaumière in Paris, where he lived from 1920 to 1938 among the writers and painters of Montparnasse, a friend of Max Jacob and Léon-Paul Fargue, exhibiting alongside Braque, Chagall, Picasso and Modigliani. At Picasso’s suggestion he spent eight years making pottery before giving it up to devote himself entirely to painting, drawing and watercolour.

From the model to the dream

The early Paris studies from the model, like the one in our sale, belong to the academies of the 1920s: fast, sure, unforced. The later work grows more oneiric, figures, nudes, landscapes and fantastical compositions in a free, lyrical hand, often in watercolour and charcoal. He returned to Monaco in 1940 and worked there for the rest of his life, dying in the canton of Neuchâtel, Switzerland, on 6 June 1985.

Where his work turns up

The Centre Pompidou holds work by Kohl, and his paintings and watercolours pass regularly through the sale rooms of Monaco and Switzerland. Dated sheets from the Paris decade are the ones collectors of the École de Paris look for. More on his artist page.

At Aurora & Athena

Seated Nude Seen from the Back, 1925, watercolour and charcoal on paper, 17 × 20 cm, framed under glass, signed and dated at the lower left, is offered on 17 October 2026 with an estimate of 300 – 400 €. Photographs, condition summary and bidding on the lot page.