Les Amoureux de la Tour Eiffel (The Eiffel Tower Lovers) combines much of the classic iconography associated with Marc Chagall and his lifelong poem to love, and to Paris. A large red sun glows behind the embracing couple flying with a rooster over the city. Old stone buildings and passerby intertwine at the bottom of the scene, watched over by a blue Eiffel Tower. Originally conceived as the frontispiece of an album of posters created at the Imprimerie Mourlot, Paris, this lithographic was made by the artist's own hands. It was Chagall himself who took up a lithographic crayon and drafted this mature image late in his career. Les Amoureux creates for the viewer a dream, where the sky swirls around the sun and lovers take to the air for a world all their own. This print showcases Chagall's vision of the French capital at its most romantic and beautiful.

Created in 1960, this original color lithograph is hand signed by Marc Chagall (Vitebsk, 1887 - Saint -Paul, 1985) in pencil at the lower right. The print is a state II of II and is numbered IX/XXV at lower left. State I impressions of Les Amoureux show just the base image in black. As one of 25 artist's proofs, our example was pulled alongside an edition of 50 signed and numbered examples, before the addition of a short block of text to the lithographic stone. After the text was added, another edition of 125 was created.

DOCUMENTED AND ILLUSTRATED IN:
1. Marc Chagall: The Lithographs, La Collection Sorlier. Ed. Gauss, Ulrike. New York: Art Publishers, 1960. Listed and illustrated as catalogue raisonné no. 187 on p. 190.
2. Mourlot, Fernand. The Lithographs of Chagall. Ed. André Sauret. New York: George Braziller, 1960. Listed and illustrated on pp. 206-7 in stage I and II as catalogue raisonné no. 187.

ABOUT THE FRAMING:
Framed to archival museum grade conservation standards, this piece is displayed in a complementary frame with silk mats and optical-grade Plexiglas.