Serge Ivanoff (1893-1983)
La Danse Basse (The low dance)

Signed and inscribed 'Serge Ivanoff Paris' (lower right) and titled 'La danse Basse' (upper left) watercolour on paper 33 x 45 cm The son of a family of Moscovite merchants, he studied painting, sculpture and architecture at the Imperial Academy of Arts. In the early 1920s he fled with his family to Paris. A talented portraitist, he executed the portraits of many personalities, including portraits of Aleksandr Benois, Zinaida Serebriakova, Lifar and many others. In 1950, Ivanoff moved to the United States. Bass dance is a court dance in moderate pace, popular in France, Italy, Burgundy Netherlands in the second half of XV and XVI centuries.