The Unknown Modigliani: Drawings from the Collection of Paul Alexandre

This stunning volume, an art-historical event, reproduces some 450 drawings by Amedeo Modigliani (1884-1920) never before published or exhibited. Including graceful female nudes, caryatids, portraits, impressions of the theater and circus, sculptural heads and studies for paintings, these drawings were made between 1906 and 1914, after the artist's move to Paris at the age of 22. In the best of them one sees flashes of Modigliani's mature style. French physician Paul Alexandre, Modigliani's friend and patron, bought the drawings and hoarded them for decades. His son, historian Noel Alexandre, provides a biographical sketch of Modigliani interwoven with his father's reminiscences, letters to and from the painter, photographs of the artist and his milieu, color reproductions of oil paintings, and a 10-page letter from Eugenia Modigliani, the artist's mother, filling in details of his youth in Livorno. This catalogue documents a globe-trotting exhibit that comes to the U.S. in 1995. (Nov.)