Lot Essay
Dina Vierny has kindly confirmed the authenticity of this work
The National Association of Boys' Clubs
The National Association of Boys' Clubs is carrying out vital work in helping young people to prepare for adult life. It is particularly fitting that, because of her own life-long interest in young people's welfare, Illa Kodicek, decided to leave the bulk of her Estate to the NABC.
The Association was founded in 1925 and today has some 2,000 clubs affiliated to it throughout the United Kingdom, with a membership of approximately 200,000 young people. Many of the clubs are at the "coal face", situated in inner-city areas and deal with a wide range of problems and difficulties which face their members each day.
The work of the NABC has never been more relevant than now. The clubs and their members are supported by a host of volunteers who give generously of their time and talent. At the last count they numbered some 25,000 men and women. Without them the clubs would simply not continue.
The programme of events and training offered by the NABC for its clubs and its members covers almost every activity, from sports to drama. Leadership training is an integral part of services offered by NABC.
For many young people, the membership of a Boys' Club has been their first chance to develop latent skills. Top sportsmen including the boxer, Henry Cooper, and footballers, Gary Lineker, John Barnes, Peter Shilton and Paul Gascoigne, started out in the atmosphere of a Boys' Club.
There are many thousands of people who owe their success in life to the care, encouragement and support they received in their Boys' Club.
Young people of today need the opportunity to join with people of their own age, in an environment which is safe, friendly and which gives them the encouragement to participate in a range of activities designed to help them grow up in a mature and responsible way. This is our investment for the future. Illa Kodicek felt the best way she could ensure that this would continue was through the National Association of Boys' Clubs.
ILLA KODICEK (1899-1990)
A small flat in Green Park House, Piccadilly, overlooking the park and the avenue of trees leading down to Buckingham Palace was home to a fine but little-known collection of modern and contemporary pictures formed during the early 1950s by a most remarkable lady.
Illa Kodicek's story begins with her birth as the second of five children (the other were all boys) in Budapest on 23 October 1899. Born Ilona Essig, her mother, Sabina, was Czech and her father, Leo Essig, was Hungarian. When Illa was only one and a half years old the family moved to Vienna. Leo Essig established a number of leather goods shops throughout Austria and Czechoslovakia. Throughout her life, Illa was renowned for her spirit and independent mind and at an early age, in order to escape the monotony of family life, she married a wealthy Viennese business man, Mr Knina, and the couple moved to Prague.
After the dissolution of her first marriage Illa met and married the distinguished Czech writer, philosopher and theatre critic Josef Kodicek. He was a leading light of his generation and knew Freud, Adler and Jung. The late Dr. Otto Radl wrote in 1957, "Josef Kodicek was the only writer of genius, critic and newspaperman, who gave his life to literature and art, theatre and films, who always stayed faithful to the democratic world outlook, and who represented the greatest influence on two subsequent generations in democratic Czechoslovakia." In Prague, the Kodiceks established themselves at the centre of society and an old acquaintance recalled that, "Before the war Illa presided over the foremost salon in Prague, was wealthy and beautiful, and a young man felt that he had really 'arrived' if he managed to get an invitation: the foremost writers and artists of the day were in attendance."
Forced to flee Prague at the time of the Munich crisis in 1938, the Kodiceks arrived with few possessions and little money in London where they created a new home and carried on the fight against oppression. During the war, Kodicek broadcast to Europe from the BBC and was the editor of the official London paper of the Czechoslovak Foreign Ministry, The Central European Observer. He died in 1954 at the age of 62.
Although Josef Kodicek was interested in pictures it appears that it was largely his wife, Illa, who initiated the collecting with the money she made from her world-famous corsetry business "Illa Knina", based in Bruton Street in London's Mayfair. Inheriting her father's talent for working materials and bringing her flair for design and business together, Illa Kodicek had founded her corsetry business in Prague before the War. Her success was brought to a halt by the flight to London where, undaunted, she re-established the House of Illa Knina which quickly became the première corsetière in Europe.
In an article by Alison Adburgham in Punch of 27 March 1957 it was stated, "For the pleasure bestowed by the contemplation of pure artistry one must visit Illa Knina. Her clients include princesses, royal duchesses, actresses - all the most famous and flattered figures in London are moulded by her foundations. These are couture corsets; made to measure, made to last, made with dedication and delight; made in nylon brocades, black-and-gold, blue-and-gold, green-and-silver and in magnificently colourful Italian flower prints. They are the costume-museum pieces of the future. She came to London at Munich time without a single client, without a penny for publicity. Yet - and this she cannot explain - from the very first day the clients came and now they come from far and wide." The business went from strength to strength under Illa Kodicek's inspired and skilful direction until she was to close it down upon her retirement in 1970.
The Kodiceks initially lived in Walton-on-Thames where their celebrated library and burgeoning art collection were displayed. In the early 1950s, Illa kept a small apartment in Curzon Street in Mayfair from where she could keep a close eye on her business. It was from here also that she was able to venture forth to the nearby art galleries. The early 1950s were the chief collecting period as she displayed her enthusiasm for the classics of modern art and her keen appreciation for the innovative trends of the young contemporary artists. She was a close friend of Victor Musgrove of Gallery One from whom she bought her first Yves Klein. Jimmy McMullan of the Obelisk Gallery was another to benefit from her patronage. She also bought works from The Hanover Gallery, The Lefevre Gallery, Marlborough Fine Art and Arthur Tooth & Sons. She became a well-known figure in the artistic circles of 1950s London, and she never lost her passion for visiting art galleries.
By 1960 her collection was by and large complete, together with its pictures, Chinese and Costa Rican works of art and Antiquities, celebrating the breadth of her interests. Later she was to boast that she never spent more than #1,000 on a work of art and thus she found the rising prices of the 70s and 80s beyond her comprehension. A testimony to the quality of her "eye" is demonstrated by the fact that her flat at Curzon Street, to which many were invited, was featured in an article in House and Garden of September 1957 entitled "An Art Patron's Flat in Curzon Street". The magnificent Braque nude provides the magazine's cover. The fully illustrated article was occasioned by Illa Kodicek commissioning the interior decorator Herman Schrijver to arrange the interior design. Michael Wickham wrote "When arranging the rooms shown here, Herman Schrijver was doubly fortunate, for he had a client who liked modern furniture and who had in his own words, "a strong and well-rounded personality". The flat presented its own challenge, or rather challenges: the considerable personality of the client, the insistent domination of many of the pictures and, above all, the almost claustrophobic enclosure of the flat itself...In such passive surroundings, the pictures acquire an unexpected domesticity. All these paintings, despite their contrast in size and technique, seem very much at ease in close proximity. In Schrijver's words, his client has 'tamed her possessions'."
Afterwards, Illa Kodicek used Herman Schrijver to create no less memorable a setting in the apartment at Green Park House where she lived from 1962 until her death in 1990.
It was her interest in the work of young artists that continued to inspire her later activities after she retired. She joined the Contemporary Art Society with which she indulged her love of travel in making a number of art tours. In 1983 she donated a work by the young Czech artist, Stanislav Kolibal, to the Tate Gallery and in 1984 she was International Adviser to the contemporary art exhibition body Rosc (The Poetry of Vision) in Dublin. She continued to visit exhibitions and entertain friends and artists, retaining her independent spirit until the end.
Appreciative of Britain providing a new home to her husband and her before the War, she latterly became interested in finding a home for her collection in London. Having been introduced to the activities of the National Association of Boys' Clubs she quickly appreciated the value of their activities and their need for funds. Thus she determined to leave her collection to the Association for the benefit of their comprehensive programme of youth care.
Aristide Maillol (1861-1944)
Details
Aristide Maillol (1861-1944)
Nu debout de dos
the stamped initial M lower right, sanguine on Maillol paper
15 x 11¾in. (38.2 x 29.9cm.)
Executed in 1930
Nu debout de dos
the stamped initial M lower right, sanguine on Maillol paper
15 x 11¾in. (38.2 x 29.9cm.)
Executed in 1930
Provenance
Gimpel Fils Gallery, London, from whom bought by Mrs Kodicek
Exhibited
Gimpel Fils, Maillol, March 1955, no. 4