Drawing for Mouchoir de Nuages

1922–1924

Working with Diaghilev and the Ballets Russes

From 1922 to 1924 he worked with Sergei Diaghilev and his ballet company; in 1924 he designed sets and costumes for the Ballets Russes.

1923

Major exhibitions in Paris and Berlin

In 1923 major exhibitions of Gris’s work took place at the Galerie Simon in Paris and the Galerie Flechtheim in Berlin.

1924

The Sorbonne lecture “The Possibilities of Painting”

In 1924 he gave his definitive lecture, Des possibilités de la peinture (“The Possibilities of Painting”), to students of the philosophy faculty at the Sorbonne, arguing that no work destined to become classic can look like a work of an earlier period. He articulated most of his aesthetic theories in 1924–25.

October 1925

Uremia and heart trouble

From October 1925 Gris was frequently ill with bouts of uremia and cardiac problems.

11 May 1927

Dies of kidney failure at forty

Gris died of kidney failure in Boulogne-Billancourt, a western suburb of Paris, on 11 May 1927, at the age of forty, leaving his wife Josette and his son Georges.

11. Mai 1927

Died