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Lot description
Oil on canvas Signed, inscribed verso. Alexis Grüss is a circus artist who was trained in the family circus at the age of seven by his father, Andre, and his uncle Alexis. During his career he tried all the disciplines of circus arts: trapeze artist, aerialist, clown, and musician. But his true talent is rooted in the old-fashioned circus art that mixes the traditions of equestrian arts and acrobatics. Grüss founded his own company in Paris in 1974, along with the actress Silvia Monfort, and established the first circus school in the country. He was in the vanguard of the revival and reinvention of the circus in France, helping earn respect for it as an art form and moving it away from a reliance on wild animals. The Cirque National Alexis Grüss, as it is now officially known, features only horses and elephants. More recently, the entire region of Provence has become an important center of circus- and street-theater arts. Susie Whitcombe, (British, b. 1957) Whitcombe studied at the Heatherley School of Art in London and has been painting portraits of horses and people in oil and watercolor for more than 30 years. She has exhibited in London, Tokyo, and Melbourne. A versatile sportswoman, she has ridden races as an amateur jockey and is also a pilot, handling Super Cubs and Tiger Moths with ease.