A rare and deeply personal sketchbook used by Marc Chagall and never before seen by the public will be auctioned at Sotheby’s Books and Manuscripts sale in New York, it was announced May 16.  The 85 page book is the only Chagall sketchbook ever to appear at auction and is estimated to sell for $600,000-$900,000.

It contains unpublished drawings in a variety of media, providing a virtual catalogue of Chagall’s colorful and moving iconography. The sketchbook originally belonged to the artist’s wife, Bella Chagall, who filled the first eight pages with her Yiddish translations of French poetry. After her death in September 1944, Marc Chagall poured his grief into the sketchbook through drawings and watercolors, many of which depict him with Bella.

This remarkably intact sketchbook was used by Marc Chagall from the 1940s to the 1960s, and includes portraits of Bella and self-portraits of the artist. These include a very beautiful ink and wash portrait of Bella in a patterned dress with a bowl of fruit. There are two sensitive portrait heads in pencil, one with closed eyes, the other with open eyes surrounded by dark circles; both drawings possibly depict Bella's final illness. Chagall himself appears in several fine self-portraits, in one as a brightly colored satyr with palette and brushes. In another, he appears as a drinker, seated next to a bottle labeled with his own initials.