(Italian, 1847-1930)

A Flirtation

Oil on canvas

26 x 19 1/4 inches

Signed

Federico Andreotti was born in Florence on March 6, 1847 and received his artistic training at the Academy in Florence. There he studied with Enrico Pollastrini (1817-1876), the President of the Academy, and Angiolo Tricca (1817-1884). His academic studies prepared him well for his chosen subject matter – historical figurative works set in the 16th and 17th centuries. The late 19th century saw a resurgence of interest in this period of elegance and many artists, including Toudouze & Moreau, in France, Marcus Stone, in England, and Madrazo, in Spain, also looked to satisfy the growing need for these works.

Andreotti’s paintings were sought after by American and European collectors alike and during the late 19th century he received an important commission from the King of Italy. While little is known about his exhibition history in Florence, he did show a number of paintings at the Royal Academy in London from 1879 – 1883; including: Her First Exhibit (1879); A Happy Father of Twins (1881); A Village Maestro (1882) and From the Wrong Cask (1883).

Andreotti combined his technical precision, learned in his anatomy classes at the Academy, with the new theories on color and technique that were being explored by the Impressionists. His paintings often feature large figures created with a colorful palette and open brush stroke, while keeping true to the academic traditions of anatomical correctness.

(French, 1827-1905)

Title: Le Retour des Champs (Return from the Fields)
Year: 1867
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 29.75 x 50 inches
Signature: Signed and dated lower right: Jules Breton 1867
Framed: 41 x 61 inches

Provenance: E. T. Stotesbury, Philadelphia, c.1897, Scott & Fowles, New York, 1922, American Art Galleries, New York, 1937, M. Knoedler & Co., New York, Hirschl & Adler Galleries, New York, 1964, Schiller and Bodo, New York, Private Collection, USA. Anderson Galleries, Beverly Hills, Private Collection, Montecito, CA

Exhibited: Paris, Salon, 1867, no. 212, “Exposition Jules Breton (1827-1906),” Musee des Beaux-Arts d’Arras, Arras, March-May 2002; Musee des Beaux-Arts de Quimper, Quimper, June-August 2002; National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, September-November 2002. “Through Vincent’s Eyes: Van Gogh and His Sources” Columbus Museum of Art, November 12, 2021 to February 6th, 2022 and the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Feb. 27th, 2022- May22, 2022.

Literature: Marius Vachon, Jules Breton, Paris, 1919, p. 33, illustrated
Bellier de la Chavignerie et Auvray, Dictionnare des Artistes de l’Ecole Francaise, Paris, 1997, vol. 1, p. 164 Henriet, “Salon de 1867” in Revue Moderne, 1867, vol.41, p. 629, Maxime du Camp, “Le Salon de 1867,” Revue des Deux Mondes, July 1, Second period, 37th year, 1867, p. 667-668 Calonne, Revue Contemporaine, 1867, vol. 9, p. 729.
Referred to in Hollister Sturges (with contributions by Gabriel P. Weisberg, Annette Bourrut-Lacouture, and Madeline Fidell-Beaufort), Jules Breton and the French Rural Tradition, Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha Nebraska, in association with The Arts Publisher, Inc., New York, 1982, referred to on page 89, catalogue no. 31, footnote no.1. Annette Bourrut Lacouture, Jules Breton: Painter of Peasant Life, 2003, Yale University Press, Page 195, Figure 95 (ill.)

The work will be included in the forthcoming online Jules Breton catalogue raisonne under preparation by Annette Bourrut Lacouture as number P1867-2.

Biography: Jules Adolphe Breton was born on May 1, 1827 to a prominent family in the small village of Courrières in the Artois region of northern France. Although his mother died when Jules was only four, he grew up in a carefree and happy environment, with much of his time spent playing in the gardens and fields with the children of the village peasants, even though they were of a different social class.

At the age of ten, Breton was sent to school at a Catholic seminary, and three years later to the college of Douai, where he received a classical education. It was his first opportunity to study drawing and he acquired a love of poetry. In the summer of 1843, he so impressed the Belgian artist, Felix de Vigne, with his portraits and sketches after nature that the artist invited Breton to study with him in his studio as well as at the Royal Academy in Ghent. It was during this time that Breton honed his skill as a draughtsman. These studies continued for three years and gave him a chance to become familiar with the Flemish Old Masters. It was their simplicity and pure, unsullied sentiment that he tried to emulate in his first mature paintings.

In 1874 he went to Paris to complete his training under the tutelage of Michel-Martin Drolling at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. A few months later Breton’s father became ill and died at Courrières. Breton left Paris to return home where the poor state of the family business interests forced the sale of the family furniture. At this time Breton began to feel a kinship with the local peasantry whom he had always loved, but with whom he had never really shared a social position. He began to paint subjects, which called attention to the plight of the poor and oppressed. It was with one of these paintings, Want and Despair (Misere et Desespoir) that he made his debut at the Salon of 1849.

Breton’s first picture from this period was greatly admired at an exhibition in Brussels. At about this same time, he became engaged to Elodie de Vigne, the daughter of his former tutor. She posed frequently for him and was the model for the principal figure in The Gleaners, his first major composition of peasant life in Courrières. It was impressive enough, along with two other pictures, for the jury of the International Salon of 1855 to award him a third class medal. Each year at the Salon his images of gleaners, harvesters and peasant women helped establish his reputation as the foremost painter of rural life. Along with several first class medals and, in 1872,the Medal of Honor, he was named a Chevalier of the Legion d’honneur in 1861, and in 1867 he was promoted to officer of the same order. His election to the Institut de France in 1886 solidified his status as one of the most respected painters of his day. His later years were spent balancing time between the busy energetic life of Paris and the tranquility and serenity of Courrières, where he worked in a garden studio at the family brewery. Breton died in Paris on July 4, 1906.

Museum collections include:
Chateau Museum, Dieppe; Arnot Art Museum, Elmira, NY; Hendrik Willem Mesdag National Museum, Hague; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha; Paine Art Center, Oshkosh; Musee d’Orsay, Paris; John G. Johnson Collection, Philadelphia; Washington University Gallery of Art, St. Louis; Toledo Museum of Art, OH; Sterling & Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown; Musee du Louvre, Paris; Brooklyn Museum of Art, NY; Baltimore Museum of Art, MD; Walters Museum, Baltimore; Antwerp Museum of Art, Belgium; Arras Museum, Calais; Bagneres Museum of Art, France; Bologne Museum of Art, France; Calais Museum of Art, France; Lille Museum of Art, France; Anvers Museum of Art, France

(French, 1848-1884)

Vieillard dans un paysage lisant un livre, 1881

(Old Man Reading a Book in a Landscape)

Oil on canvas

17 ¾ inches x 16 ¼ inches (45 x 42 cm)

Signed and dated lower left: J. Bastien Lepage 81

Framed: 24 x 22 ½ inches

Provenance:

John H. McKay, New York, Parke Bernet Gallery, March 12th, 1969, Old Master, Barbizon & Other Nineteenth Century Paintings, lot 156. Raydon Gallery, New York City, 1969 , Mr. Gerald Davey, New Jersey, Private Collection, California by descent, Anderson Galleries, Beverly Hills.

Literature:

Marie-Madeleine Aubrun, Jules Bastien-Lepage, catalogue raisonné de l'Oeuvre, 1985, p. 215, no. 331 as Vieillard dans un paysage lisant un livre (location unknown).

Biography:

At the time of his death at the young age of 36 in 1884, Bastien-Lepage was avidly collected in Europe and America, and exerted tremendous influence on an international group of followers from France, Germany, England, America and beyond, who took up his Naturalist* approach to painting and made it one of the dominant movements at the Paris Salons* of the 1880s and 1890s.

Deeply connected to his roots in the rural countryside of France, this intimate portrait of an elderly man lost in thought is undoubtedly a local resident from his home village of Damvillers. It is a striking example of the artist's direct and honest approach to his subject, his interest in natural light, and the modern painting techniques adopted from the Impressionists. In a departure from traditional methods of painting, Bastien-Lepage employed plein-air painting, photography, and the use of outdoor, glass studios to achieve a heightened sense of reality, of psychology, and of light and atmosphere in his paintings.

From the mid-1870s, Bastien-Lepage focused his subjects on life in his native Damvillers in the Meuse region of north-eastern France. In works such as Les Foins (1880, Musée d'Orsay), Saison d'octobre, récolte des pommes de terre (1879, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne), Pas mèche (1882, National Gallery of Scotland), and L'Amour au village (1883, Pushkin Museum, Moscow), the distinct landscape of the Meuse plays a significant role in the regionalist character of Bastien-Lepage's work. The rolling hills, broad patches of open fields, and red-roofed structures appear in numerous works, giving his peasant subjects a distinct and identifiable setting.

In addition to making the specificity of locale a running theme in his work, Bastien-Lepage's working methods, which explored the visual qualities of light and atmosphere, further heightened the reality and modernity of his paintings. In the present work, the gardens in the foreground depicted in broad slashes of varying greens and earth tones. Changes in the play of light and shadow on the various crops, or on dry earth or open grass are depicted, while the precise visual interpretation of the landscape plays a secondary role. Atmosphere also gains a significance, as it blurs the range of color and strong light in the distant hills and village. This focus on the visual qualities and effects of light reveals a modern approach to painting that should not be underestimated.

Museum Collections include: Musee du Louvre, Paris , Musee D’Orsay, Paris , Musee Rodin, Paris, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC ,National Portrait Gallery, London, The National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin.

(French, 1901-1977)

Title: Le Bouquet a Cannes

Year: Circa 1960

Medium: Oil on canvas

Dimension: 32 x 25 inches

Signed: Signed lower right, also signed and titled verso

Provenance: Private collection, Los Angeles, 1960 to the present. (Commissioned directly from the artist.)

Cavailles began his career as a technical draughtsman during which time he met “le pere Artigue” - who was a friend of the famous pointillist artist Henri Martin – and who encouraged him to go to Paris to study fine art. In 1925 he enrolled at the Académie Julian and he began exhibiting at the various Parisian Salons from 1928 – the Société des Artistes Français, Société des Artistes Indépendants and Salon d'Automne. To fund his studies he opened a small chemist shop. He was soon invited to participate at the Salon des Tuileries and in 1936 he organised the 14th exhibition of the Artistes de ce temps in the Petit-Palais. In the same year he received the prestigious Grant Blumenthal[4] and he was soon awarded the commission to decorate the Pavilion of Languedoc for the Exposition Universelle. He was part of a group of artists called “La Realite Poetique”. His artistic style is characterised by the juxtaposition of pure colour, derived from an interpretation of fauvist painting which was less interested in the early Fauve artists’ search for intensity and dynamism than a simple expression of ‘joie de vivre’.

He worked in oils, gouache, and pastel, and his subject matter featured figures, portraits, nudes, still lifes, flowers, landscapes, and animals. His work is represented in many leading collections and museums, including the Modern Art Museum in Paris, and the museums in Toulouse, Albi, Marseilles, Chicago, and Helsinki.

Title: Ma Mere
Year: c. 1920
Medium: Oil on panel
Dimensions: 17 x 13.5 inches
Signature: Signed lower right: Edouard Cortes
Condition: Good
Framed: 22 x 18 inches

Cortes’ paintings of scenes in and around Lagny include glimpses of his home and family. His pictures of friends and family in intimate settings, establish an atmosphere of sincerity and tranquility.

Edouard Cortes was born into a family of artists and artisans in Paris, 1882. His grandfather, Andre Cortes, was famous for his work on the stained glass windows of the Cathedral of Seville and his father, Antonio Cortes, was a painter at the royal court of Spain. In this artistically conducive atmosphere, Edouard showed exceptional talent early and decided at a young age that he was destined to be a painter. He once said, “I was born from and for painting.”

In his youth, Cortes trained at his father’s studio and was also given advice and encouragement from his brother (also a painter) and other local artists. Surprisingly, before undergoing his formal education at the National French Art School in Paris, a sixteen-year old Cortes first exhibited his work at the national exhibition of the Societe des Artistes Francais in Paris, 1899. His large painting, Le Labour, was a great success and the French press lauded the young phenomenon of the French art scene.

Edouard eventually became a member of the French Artists’ Society, exhibiting his works every year as his reputation began to grow. In 1901 Cortes began his long tradition of painting different vignettes of Paris. He also painted familial interiors, landscapes, and seascapes but achieved his greatest fame through these masterly and expressive Parisian scenes. In 1915, he was awarded the Silver Medal at the Salon des Artistes Francais and the Gold Medal at the Salon des Independents. He also received numerous awards at the Salon d’Hiver during his artistic career. Because of his pacifist beliefs stemming from his direct involvement with WWI, he refused the Legion of Honor offered by the French government for his artistic success and contributions.

(French, 1842-1910)
Bords de la Seine. Le Soir
Oil on panel, 16 x 28 inches
Signed and dated lower right: H C Delpy, 1905
Framed: 27 x 39 inches

The subject matter of Delpy’s painting is a romantic vision of country life along a French river. The laundress along a riverbank is a popular theme for Delpy as well as many other prominent French painters ( Leon L’Hermitte, Charles Francois Daubigny, Louis Hervier, Jean Francois Millet, Jules Breton, etc). All of these seemingly disparate artists painted works which develop the motif of country women working at the banks of a scenic river. Their paintings, as well as those of Delpy, illustrate a harmony between humanity performing basic tasks and nature at its most picturesque. Indeed, a common vein of dignifying and elevating the daily chores of pastoral life unifies all these artist's laundry scenes. The glorious sunset in the current painting particularly illuminates the laundresses and creates a venerated, romantic vision of rural living.

Hippolyte Camille Delpy was born in Joigny in 1842 and was a student of the Barbizon painter Charles Francois Daubigny. It was Daubigny, a friend of the family, who took the young Camille along with him on his strolls. The child saw Daubigny paint and admired his creations, and from that point on, his only aspiration was to become a painter. In Paris, Daubigny introduced his young pupil to Corot, another famed Barbizon painter who later admitted Delpy into his studio.

In 1869, Delpy began to exhibit at the Salon. During this time, he also traveled extensively throughout the provinces, especially visiting Corot in Ville d’Avray, and Daubigny in Auvers-sur-Oise. In the 1870s, Delpy met Pissarro and Cézanne, who had a great impact on Delpy’s use of color, at Auvers. Although he remained faithful to the technique of Daubigny, Delpy’s interaction with these avant-garde painters brought a more vigorous touch and a greater intensity of color to his work.

Delpy’s first gallery exhibition was at the ‘Galerie des Artistes Modernes’ in Paris and it was surprisingly successful. He also exhibited in the ‘Exposition International,’ with DeNittis, Whistler, Monet, Sisley, Pissarro, Renoir and Morisot. To find Delpy in this company clearly shows the esteem with which he was held.

Museum Collections Include:
Phoenix Art Museum, AZ; Brigham Young University Fine Arts Collection, Provo, UT; Beziers Museum, France; Louviers Museum, France

(French, 1807-1876)

Title: Paysage avec lac et des arbres
Year: Circa 1858-1860
Medium: Oil on panel
Dimensions: 8 x 12 1/2 inches
Signature: Signed lower right: N. Diaz
Condition: Good
Framed: 14 x 19 inches

Expertise: Michel Rodrigue has confirmed the authenticity of this work.

Biography: Narcisse Virgile Diaz de la Pena was born to Spanish emigrant parents on August 20, 1808 in Bordeaux. He survived the loss of a leg in a childhood accident and further suffered the death of his parents at age fifteen.

Diaz’s artistic training was as a porcelain painter and he studied briefly with the painter Souchon. His early paintings catered to the popular taste for 18th century sty1e Rococo and resulted in financial success for the young artist. Fetes galantes were favorite subjects and the women depicted in Diaz’s canvases were often cloaked in exotic Turkish garb, reflecting the artist’s admiration for Delacroix and his orientalist followers. Indeed Diaz’s first Salon entry in 1831 was titled Scene Amour.

Diaz first visited Barbizon in 1835 and it was in 1837 that he met Rousseau. The inf1uence of Rousseau could be seen in Diaz’s Salon entry of that year depicting a view of Fontainebleau Forest. Through the 1840s, his figure paintings continued to be the major part of his work, and are thought to have influenced the female subjects of Corot, Renoir and certainly Monticelli.

Though figure painting would always remain important for Diaz, it is his landscapes of the 1850s—particularly of the Fontainebleau Forest—for which the artist is most remembered. Recognized as a superb colorist in his day, his forest interiors are richly painted with warm browns, oranges, golds and silvery tree trunks and branches. Though the artist often applied paint loosely with a broad palette knife, his observation of nature was nevertheless keen. A regular exhibitor at the Salon, in 1848 Diaz won a first-class medal, and received the Legion d’honneur. A good-natured and generous man, Diaz’s financia1 success enabled him to lend a helping hand to his friends when in need, including Troyon, Rousseau and Millet. The artist died at Menton on November 18, 1876.

Museum Collections Include:
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Detroit Institute of Art, MI, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco; Fitzwilliam Museum, University of Cambridge; Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg; Louvre Museum Database, Paris; Minneapolis Institute of Arts, MN; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; National Gallery, London; Wallace Collection, London; Cleveland Museum of Art, OH; Courtauld Institute of Art, London; Mildred Lane Kemper Art Musuem, St. Louis; Mohamed Mahmoud Khalil & Wife Museum, Egypt; Montana Museum of Art & Culture, Missoula; Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux, France; National Gallery of Victoria, Australia; New Art Gallery, Walsall; Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena; Philadelphia Museum of Art, PA; St. Louis Art Museum, MO; Victoria & Albert Museum, London

(French, 1807-1876)

Title: Young Woman in a Red Costume
Year: Circa 1850
Medium: Oil on cradled panel
Dimensions: 9 ¼ x 7 1/8 inches
Signature: Signed
Condition: Good
Framed: 17 x 15 inches

Expertise: Catalogued and illustrated in:
Pierre et Rolande Miguel, Narcisse Diaz de la Peña, Catalogue raisonné de l’oeuvre peint, Vol II, p. 279, no. 1734

Biography:Diaz’s artistic training was as a porcelain painter and he studied briefly with the painter Souchon. His early paintings catered to the popular taste for 18th century sty1e Rococo and resulted in financial success for the young artist. Fetes galantes were favorite subjects and the women depicted in Diaz’s canvases were often cloaked in exotic Turkish garb, reflecting the artist’s admiration for Delacroix and his orientalist followers. Indeed Diaz’s first Salon entry in 1831 was titled Scene Amour.

Diaz first visited Barbizon in 1835 and it was in 1837 that he met Rousseau. The inf1uence of Rousseau could be seen in Diaz’s Salon entry of that year depicting a view of Fontainebleau Forest. Through the 1840s, his figure paintings continued to be the major part of his work, and are thought to have influenced the female subjects of Corot, Renoir and certainly Monticelli.

Though figure painting would always remain important for Diaz, it is his landscapes of the 1850s—particularly of the Fontainebleau Forest—for which the artist is most remembered. Recognized as a superb colorist in his day, his forest interiors are richly painted with warm browns, oranges, golds and silvery tree trunks and branches. Though the artist often applied paint loosely with a broad palette knife, his observation of nature was nevertheless keen. A regular exhibitor at the Salon, in 1848 Diaz won a first-class medal, and received the Legion d’honneur. A good-natured and generous man, Diaz’s financia1 success enabled him to lend a helping hand to his friends when in need, including Troyon, Rousseau and Millet. The artist died at Menton on November 18, 1876.

Museum Collections Include:
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Detroit Institute of Art, MI, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco; Fitzwilliam Museum, University of Cambridge; Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg; Louvre Museum Database, Paris; Minneapolis Institute of Arts, MN; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; National Gallery, London; Wallace Collection, London; Cleveland Museum of Art, OH; Courtauld Institute of Art, London; Mildred Lane Kemper Art Musuem, St. Louis; Mohamed Mahmoud Khalil & Wife Museum, Egypt; Montana Museum of Art & Culture, Missoula; Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux, France; National Gallery of Victoria, Australia; New Art Gallery, Walsall; Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena; Philadelphia Museum of Art, PA; St. Louis Art Museum, MO; Victoria & Albert Museum, London

(German, 1893-1963)

Title: Modiste
Year: c. 1950
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 24 x 18 inches
Signature: Signed lower left: Edzard
Condition: Good
Framed: 31 x 25 inches

Biography: Dietz Edzard was born in Bremen in 1893. He traveled extensively through Germany, Holland and France. Edzard, a colorful artist who has carried on the traditions of the masters of French Impressionism, studied painting with Max Beckmann. In 1929, Edzard's work was included in an exhibition of contemporary painting at the Jeu de Paume, Paris, a museum dedicated to the Impressionist masters. In 1938, Edzard married Suzanne Eisendieck (1908-1998), a well-regarded artist in her own right who worked in an impressionist style.

In his book D. Edzard, Gerd Muehsam writes: "Edzard has captured in his canvases the charm of the Parisian atmosphere. With the light, vibrant touch of his brush, he produced sparkling, and yet delicate, paintings of beautiful women, dancers and flowers. His brilliant delineations of circus life and the theatre, his spirited portrayals of Parisian café scenes have made him a favorite of art circles in this country and abroad."

"Consciously, (Edzard) turns his back on the experimental art of his contemporaries, opposes all weighting of art with programs and theorems. Deliberately, he avoids the representation of human conflict and inner discords and the chaos and shifting quicksands of modern existence. Instead, he prefers to work along well-defined modes of expression. The line begun in portraits of Velazquez and Goya and continued in the art of Manet and Renoir becomes Edzard's artistic credo."

(French, 1857-1945)

Title: The Muse of Autumn
Year: C.1900
Medium: Pastel on canvas
Dimensions: 36 x 26 inches
Signature: Signed lower left: D. Enjolras
Condition: Good
Framed: 46 x 36 inches

Provenance: Galerie Léon Gerard, 18 Rue Drouet, Paris
Private Collection, Paris, Private collection, Florida.

Biography: Renowned as a portraitist of the upper echelons of society, Enroljas particularly favored depicting women in intimate settings alone or among friends, illuminated by a soft glow of light. Enjolras frequently used light to create atmosphere, highlighting the figures’ exposed skin and diaphanous drapery.

Delphin Enjolras was born on May 13, 1857 in the historic town of Coucouron in the Ardèche. His formal artistic training began in Paris at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts under the esteemed Salon painter Jean-Léon Gérôme. Enjolras also studied with Pascal Adolphe Jean Dagnan-Bouveret and Gustave Claude Etienne Courtois, and is recorded as having furthered his artistic education at the Ecole de Dessin in Paris under Gaston Gérard. Having made his debut at the Société des Artistes Français in 1889 he was elected a member in 1901 and continued to show works with the Société up until 1909.

Best known for his dazzling studies of young women illuminated by lamp light or engaged in domestic activities, he also portrayed a number of Orientalist subjects, genre scenes and society portraits. In addition Enjolras painted city views as well as beautiful landscapes. The majority of his works exhibited at the Salon (from 1890) tended to focus contemporary bourgeois settings of which the present work is typical.

Museum Collections Include:
Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco; Musee Crozatier, Musee du Puy; Musee d’Avignon

(French, 1815-1908)
Un Incedent Domestique
Oil on canvas, 31 x 21.5 inches
Signed lower right: Eug. Feyen

A day of chores abruptly ends with a dashed vase, an alarmed mother, a surprised dog and a remorseful young woman in this charming and expertly painted genre scene. Feyen renders each element of gesture, costume and object in the composition with a clarity that is nearly photographic; a testament to his academic training and skill.

Jacques-Eugène Feyen enrolled at l'École des Beaux-Arts de Paris in 1837 where he studied with Léon Cogniet and then later Paul Delaroche. He specialized in Breton seascapes and especially the activities of fishermen from Cancale, where he habitually spent his summers. Vincent van Gogh was a fan of Feyen and describes him as, "one of the few painters who pictures intimate modern life as it really is". He exhibited at the Salon in Paris from 1841 to 1882, where he was awarded medals in 1866 and 1880. He was also the recipient of the Légion d'Honneur in 1881.

(French, 1879-1949)

Title: Vase de Roses
Year: c. 1900
Medium: Oil on canvas laid down on panel
Dimensions: 18.5 x 10.5 inches
Signature: Signed
Condition: Good
Framed: 28 x 20 inches

Provenance:
Mme. Brotter-Friesz (Daughter of the artist)

Accompanied by certificate No. #31670 from Mme. J.Brottet-Friesz

Provenence:
Studio of the artist
Mme. J. Brottet-Friesz (by descent)
Wally Findlay Galleries, 1980
Private collection, California

Biography: Achille-Émile-Othon Friesz, who later just called himself Othon Friesz, was born in Le Havre in 1879. Early on he was encouraged by his parents to become a painter and as soon as 1892 he began training at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Le Havre, where he worked at Charles-Marie Lhullier's workshop. It was there that he met with Raoul Dufy and George Braque, with whom he developed a lasting friendship and travelled. In 1897 Friesz was granted a scholarship and studied until 1903 under Léon Bonnat at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. He met with Henri Charles Manguin, Albert Marquet, Henri Matisse and Charles Camoin. Especially his contact to Camille Pissaro influenced Friesz in that period of creativity. The painter made his artistic debut in 1900 at the Salon of the Société des Artistes français. Then he exhibited work in 1904 at the first Salon d'Automne and again in 1906 at the Salon des Indépendants. Over the years Friesz abandoned his former nature-orientated concept in favour of works formed by Fauvism. The artiste travelled extensively, et al. to Portugal in 1911 and to Belgium in 1912. Stays in Munich and Düsseldorf as well as the participation in exhibitions by the Berlin Secession made Friesz's work known in Germany as well. Friesz, who participated in exhibitions not only throughout Europe but also in the Armory Show in New York as well as in Chicago, taught between 1912 and 1921 at the Académie Moderne in Paris, from 1925 at the Académie Scandinave and from 1944 at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. An outstanding late work is the decoration he did with Raoul Dufy for the Palais de Chaillot on the occasion of the world fair in Paris in 1937. Even though the artist used a more traditional, austere technique in his late works, several of his earlier works, especially from 1907, are regarded as the boldest examples of Fauvism.

(French, 1842-1899) T, Before the Hunt, 1886
Oil on canvas, 22 x 27 inches (framed, 35 x 40 inches)
Signed and dated lower left: R. Goubié, 1886

Jean Richard Goubié was born in Paris in 1842, he was a pupil of the great French academic master Jean-Leon Gerome. He exhibited at the Paris Salon between 1869 and 1893 an earned a third class medal in 1874. The main subjects of Jean-Richard Goubie’s paintings were animals - especially horses, which he portrayed with careful observation, anatomical accuracy and with obvious delight. Goubié painted a number of highly successful society pictures showing men and women out hunting or simply enjoying a ride in the countryside. His paintings were widely appreciated and collected in America during is lifetime.

(French, 1846-1921)
An Afternoon Stroll
Circa 1900
Oil on canvas, 17 x 26 inches
Signed lower left: Isenbart

Isenbart was a skillful regional painter who combined aspects of the French realist tradition tempered by Impressionist sensibilities. A great admirer of Courbet who also lived in and worked in the Franche-Comté region, Isenbart was also a great believer in seeking to portray the “truth” of his subjects. In An Afternoon Stroll, two elegantly dressed women walk arm in arm along a path on a summer day. The lush and verdant landscape is expertly painted, as is the reflection of the sky in the slow-moving waters of the stream. The red umbrella held by the figure on the right, is a device frequently employed by both Corot and Courbet in similar scenes. This bright dash of color is a visual exclamation point that highlights the placement of the figures within the composition. In addition, it immediately indicates that these figures are upper class; they are out for a walk to enjoy and experience nature rather than to labor in nature. This marks an important shift in emphasis for French 19th Century landscape painting from scenes of rural labor championed by the Barbizon School to the daily life of the leisure class featured by the Impressionists.

Born on March 3, 1846 in Besançon into a modest family (his father was a furniture maker), Émile Isenbart studied at the Saint-François Xavier college and became interested in painting at an early age. He was a student of Clément (Antonin) Fanart. His style is very influenced by that of Courbet, Corot and members of the Barbizon School. He participated in the Salon from 1872, then in the Salon des Artistes Français. He received numerous awards. In 1883, he was elected to the Besançon Academy and promoted to Knight of the Legion of Honor in 1897. He distinguished himself in painting landscapes: landscapes of mountains and water. His work is not limited to the landscapes of Franche-Comté, he explores France, especially Brittany, including Brest where his wife was from.

Émile Isenbart frequently paints outdoors, in nature, working inside only in cold weather. He is, par excellence, a Franc-Comtois artist. The majority of his paintings are thus devoted to the region: The black valley at Consolation, Terrace of the Consolation convent, Forest of fir trees in the mountains of Doubs, The banks of the Doubs, The morning at the edge of the Loue, The Citadel of Besançon view of Micaud, The old Chamars, Marais au Bélieu, The peat bogs of Bélieu, The village of Noël-Cerneux, The little stream at Beure, Autumn evening around Besançon, Velotte, Herd at the water's edge, hay in Franche-Comté.

Émile Isenbart exhibited in all major cities in France and several times in Besançon. He is notably the author of large frescoes for the hall of the lost steps of the Besançon Palace of Justice. The artist died in March 1921 in Besançon.

(French, 1813-1894)

Title: Bergere au Repos dans le Foret
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 32 x 25.5 inches
Signature: Signed lower left: Ch. Jacque
Condition: Good
Framed: 41 x 35 inches

Biography: Bergere au Repos typifies the artist’s realistic yet sensitive depictions of shepherds and their flocks. Jacque’s interpretation of this theme forms one of the most cohesive and important bodies of work produced by the Barbizon movement.

Charles Jacque was a primary and influential member of the Barbizon School, or “Men of 1830.” Born in Paris, Jacque began his training, not in painting but in etching, as an apprentice to a map engraver. In this area, Jacque was unsurpassed among his colleagues in the Barbizon School. After military service, he went to England where he worked as an engraver for the magazine La Charivari. Returning to France after two years abroad, he made his Salon debut in 1833 and regularly contributed paintings every year until 1870. Winning medals for both etching and painting, he was awarded the Legion d’honneur in 1867.

During the 1840s, he and his friend Millet moved to the village of Barbizon, where they felt they cou1d more realistically portray nature. He was also involved in non-artistic activities, such as land speculation and poultry breeding (about which he wrote a book, Le Poulailler, monographie des poules indigences et exotiques, published in 1848). However, even with his outside interests, Jacque continued to produce a great many works in the two mediums of painting and etching. Employing a new and more vigorous style helped make him a popular artist with many patrons in the Lowlands, the British Isles and the United States.

Museum Collections Include:
Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg; Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston; Musee du Louvre, Paris; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena; Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown

(French, 1823-1896)

Title: The Laundress
Year: 1882
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 49 ½ x 31 1/3 inches
Signature: Signed and dated lower right: D. F. Laugee, 1882
Condition: Good
Framed: 61 x 43 ½ inches

Exhibited: Paris, Salon des artistes français, 1882, no. 1553, as Le Lessive.

Biography: Although the painter and poet Désiré-François Laugée was very successful in his lifetime, and his work can still be found in a number of Parisian churches and elsewhere, his reputation has fallen into obscurity since his death, and he remains very little known today. Born in a village near Rouen, Laugée grew up in Saint-Quentin, where he first studied before enrolling in 1840 in the studio of François-Edouard Picot at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. He exhibited at the Salon for the first time in 1845, showing a double portrait of a father and son (thought to be a self-portrait with his father), and it is as a portrait painter that he first established a reputation. A friend of Alexandre Dumas and Victor Hugo, he painted portraits of Hugo and the historian and writer Henri Martin, and frequently sent portraits to the Salon, until 1859. He also painted religious subjects, both in the form of easel pictures which were exhibited at the Salons and as mural paintings for such Parisian churches as Sainte-Clotilde, Sainte-Trinité and Saint-Pierre-du-Gros-Caillou, as well as the Basilica of Saint-Quentin.

Laugée was also highly regarded as a painter of historical subjects, such as The Death of Zurbaran, which won a third-class medal at the 1851 Salon, and The Siege of Saint-Quentin, exhibited the following year. He won several prizes at the Salons, and a number of his religious and historical subject pictures were purchased by the State, including Saint Louis Washing the Feet of the Poor, which was shown at the Salon of 1863. Among the secular public commissions Laugée received were the decoration of the Hôtel Continental (now the Westin) on the Rue de Rivoli, as well as the cupola of the Bourse de Commerce in Paris; painted between 1888 and 1889, the latter frescoes have been detached and are now in the Musée Carnavalet. Later in his career, Laugée came to specialize in paintings of pastoral and rustic subjects, in a manner akin to the work of the artists of the Barbizon school, and among his pupils was the Realist genre painter Julien Dupré. Several paintings by Laugée are today in the collection of the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Rouen, while others are in the Louvre and the museums of Amiens, Avignon, Lille, Limoges and Troyes.

Museum Collections include: Peasant Women of Picardy (Museum of Fine Arts, Bordeaux) and A Picardy Woman Spinning Wool (Museum of Fine Arts, Amiens). Museum of Fine Art, Troyes; Musee du Louvre, Paris; Avignon Museum; Montreal Museum of Art, Quebec.

(French, 1844-1925)
Laveuses près de la Marne, 1903
Pastel on paper laid down on canvas
17 ¾ x 13 ¾ inches, 45.1 x 34.9 cm
Signed lower left: L. Lhermitte
Framed: 34 x 29 ¾ inches

Provenance:
Boussod Valadon and Co. Paris, N. 20456
Nicolas
The Fine Art Society, Ltd. London 1984
Georges Marciano, Beverly Hills, CA
Private collection, Palm Desert, CA

Literature:
M. Le Pelley Fonteny, Léon Augustin Lhermitte: catalogue raisonne, Paris, 1991, color plate 39, page 57 (illustrated) and #910, (illustrated) page 301.

In a letter to his brother Theo in 1885, Vincent Van Gogh observed:

“Lhermitte’s a master of the figure. He’s able to do what he likes with it. There’s something astonishing and masterly in everything he does.”

Washing laundry on the banks of the Marne was a favorite subject for the artist, but this composition is among his most striking. While the women’s labor is hard, the cadence of their movement appears almost dancelike as dusk approaches.

Leon Lhermitte spent the formative years of his life in rural northern France before moving to Paris at the age of 19 in 1863 to attend the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, and debuting at the salon the following year. He has been praised for his monumental and unsentimental treatment of the peasant life with which he himself was so familiar from an early age.

L’Hermitte sent his initial entry to the Salon in 1864 at the age of 19; he continued to exhibit charcoal drawings and paintings regularly and pastels after 1885, winning his first medal in 1874 with La Moisson (Musee de Carcassonne). Other prizes and honors came to L’Hermitte throughout his long career, including the Grand Prix at the Exhibition Universelle in 1889, the Diplome d’honneur at Dresden in 1890, and the Legion d’honneur. He was a founding member of the Societe Nationale des Beaux-Arts.

Museum Collections include: Municipal Gallery of Modern Art, Dublin; Goteborg Art Gallery, Sweden; Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton; Melton Park Gallery, Oklahoma City; Oklahoma City Art Museum, OK; Paine Art Center, Oshkosh; Ashmolean Museum, Oxford; Musee d’Orsay, Paris; van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam; John G. Johnson Collection, Philadelphia; Reading Public Museum and Art Gallery, PA; Memorial Art Gallery, University of Rochester; Museum of Fine Art, Saintes; Marion Koogler McNay Art Institute, San Antonio; Washington University Gallery of Art, St. Louis; National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo; Toledo Museum of Art, OH; Art Gallery, Ontario; Art Institute of Chicago, IL; Museum of Fine Art, Boston; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Cleveland Museum of Art, OH; Denver Museum of Art, CO; Montreal Museum of Fine Art, Canada

(Austrian, 1876-1944)

Title: Elegant Woman on a Divan
Year: 1919
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 30 x 28 inches
Signature: Signed lower right: Gino Parin
Condition: Good
Framed: 38 x 36 inches

Biography: He began his studies in his home town with Eugenio Scomparini (who may have inspired his pseudonym), then attended the Accademia di Belle Arti di Venezia. He finished his studies at the Academy of Fine Arts, Munich with Karl Raupp.[1] It was there he had his first exhibition. At first, he was mostly a caricaturist; satirizing the conventional German bourgeoisie.

While visiting Paris, he met Ella Auler (1875–1962), an artist and musician from St.Louis, Missouri. Later, they were married. Their son, Edgar, emigrated to the United States and, together with his wife, Ingri, became a noted writer and illustrator of children's books.

When he returned to Trieste, he began painting portraits; producing a long series devoted to the families of Ernesto Lackenbacher, an executive with Riunione Adriatica di Sicurtà [it] (a Joint-stock company), and Moise Mario Tedeschi (1853–1919), an engineer. In 1913, he won a gold medal at the XI Internationalen Kunstausstellung in the Glaspalast.

Between the wars, he exhibited in Vienna (where he was a member of the Hagenbund) and Trieste, and had two showings at the Biennale di Venezia. He also attended exhibitions overseas and was awarded another gold medal at the Internazionale Quadriennale of Turin in 1923.[1]

He maintained close ties with Germany, although the racial laws prohibited him from exhibiting there after 1938. When he was a young man, he had acquired Swiss citizenship and was a legal resident of Campo Blenio.[2] Nevertheless, he was detained in Italy and deported to the concentration camp at Bergen-Belsen. Along the way, he became seriously ill and died shortly after arriving.

(Spanish, 1855-1907)
Still Waters
Oil on panel, 13.25 x 16 inches (33.7 x 40.6 cm)
Signed lower and inscribed lower left: E. Sanchez-Perrier “Guillera”

Emilio Sanchez-Perrier studied at the school of Fine Arts in Seville and later at the school of Fine Arts in Madrid. In 1871 he lived in Granada with Martin Rico, where he became friends with Mariano Fortuny. In 1879 he lived in Paris and studied at the studios of Auguste Bolard, Leon Gerome and Felix Ziem.

He exhibited in various group exhibitions: In 1878 at the exhibition of the national fine arts society of Madrid; in 1879 at the Cadiz regional exhibition, where he was awarded a gold metal; and from 1880 at the Salon des Artistes Francais, receiving a commendation in 1886 and a silver metal at the Exposition Universelle of 1889. He was made a member of the Seville fine art academy.

Sanchez Perrier painted landscapes, genre, architectures, and water scenes. Sanchez- Perrier is best known for his scenic paintings of Venice, which feature intimate views as well as large vistas of this iconic European city. Sanchez- Perrier’s romantic atmospheric style of painting remains very popular and his works can be found in important private and museum collections throughout America and Europe.

(French, 1850-1924)
Une Rue en Hiver, pres a Paris
(A Street in Winter Near Paris)
Circa 1890
Oil on paper on canvas
18 x 12.5 inches (45.7 x 31.75 cm)
Signed lower left: J. F. Raffaelli

Jean-François Raffaëlli was a unique voice in the Paris art establishment in the late nineteenth century. During his lifetime he was both critically acclaimed at the Salon, where like Manet, he tenaciously sought inclusion, but he also participated in the landmark Impressionist exhibitions. Raffaëlli trained in the studio of Jean-Léon Gérôme, and also befriended Degas, who would become his ardent supporter.
Unlike most of the "pure" Impressionists of the 1870s, Raffaëlli, like Degas shared a predilection for drawing, which may well have been the basis for the sympathetic relationship between the two artists. By the 1890s, Raffaëlli was proud to call himself an Impressionist.
In 1879, , Raffaëlli left Paris and settled in the suburb of Asnières. With its incessantly spewing smokestacks, this desolate region provided the backdrop for Raffaëlli's paintings from this period. There, among the faces and expressions of its inhabitants - retired workmen, rag pickers, beggars, garlic sellers and chimney sweepers - Raffaëlli found his inspiration."

Raffaelli enrolled at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in order to study under Gerome. He remained exclusively a painter until 1876 when he did his first etching. From this time on he was passionately devoted to print making, experimenting extensively with color etching. He became very proficient at this technique and in 1904 founded the “Salon de l’eau forte en couleurs.”
Raffaelli was a great friend of the Impressionists—particularly of Edgar Degas, Camille Pissarro, and Mary Cassatt. Bitter quarrels with Degas and his own growing success in the Salon, however, eventually caused him to move away from that group and increasingly into the world of the official art establishment. However, he did remain on good terms with Cassatt and Pissarro, artists who shared his love of color etching. He was basically an Impressionist and remained true to the subjects he knew best, such as the suburbs of Paris, the landscapes and villages along the Seine, and the animals of the countryside. With rare acuity of vision, Raffaelli also depicted the downtrodden or work weary figures, carefully individualized in their accustomed milieu.

Museum collections:
Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY; Maryhill Museum of Fine Arts, Goldendale, WA; Goteborg Art Gallery, Sweden; Museum of Pictorial Art, Leipzig; Ball State University Art Gallery, Muncie, IN; Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY; Melton Park Gallery, Oklahoma City; National Gallery, Oslo; Kroller-Muller National Museum, Otterloo, Netherlands; John G. Johnson Collection, Philadelphia; Phoenix Art Museum, AZ; Telfair Academy of Arts and Science, Savannah; Municipal Museum of Fine Arts, Tandil, Argentina; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Musee du Louvre, Paris; Museum of Fine Arts, Brussels, Belgium, Copenhagen

(French, 1840-1920)

The Troubadours

Oil on panel

44 1/4 x 58 inches (113 x 146cm)

Signed lower right: F. Roybet 1887

Provenance: Private collection, United Kingdom, Christies, London, March 20th, 1998, Lot # 103, Private Collection, Los Angeles to the present.

Ferdinand Roybet's paintings revel in the costumed glamour of the European courts of old and have maintained an enduring appeal among collectors. His mastery of light and shadow and superb textural detailing cemented his status as one of the great 19th Century genre painters of his age.

A student of the École des Beaux-Arts in Lyon, his debut at the Salon of 1865 met with both critical and financial success. His much-admired style reached its zenith upon his 1870 sojourn to Holland at the onset of the Franco-Prussian War, when he was exposed to the work of Frans Hals, with its slashing brushwork and vigorous paint application.

The Troubadours is one of Roybet's most important and dynamic compositions featuring the subject matter for which he is best known. A richly dressed nobleman and his retinue greet a lively and richly costumed troupe of musicians, instruments at the ready. The vibrant and shimmering fabrics throughout are a hallmark of this artist's best work. Each figure's position, intention and gesture adds to the narrative and skillfully draws the viewer into the painting.

His panache for painting technically detailed 16th and 17th century subjects and subjects afforded him a great degree of popularity as a young artist. In 1866, just two years after he began exhibiting in The Salon in Paris, he was awarded a medal for “Jester of Henri III.” In 1893. Roybet became a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour.

Selected Museums

Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

Cliveden Estate, Buckinghamshire, UK

Musée des Beaux-Arts, Bordeaux, France

Musée des Beaux-Arts, Mulhouse, France

Musée des Beaux-Arts, Nîmes, France

Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal, Canada

Musée d’Orsay, Paris

Musée Roybet Fould, Courbevoie, France

Museu Nacional de Belas Artes, Argentina

National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.

Syracuse University Art Gallery, Syracuse, New York

The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, FL

The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg

(French, 1814-1898)
Nude with Bouquet
Oil on canvas, 40 x 29.25 inches
Signed lower right: Salles-Wagner

Salles-Wagner was particularly intrigued with idealized scenes of Italian peasants and often painted young women, such as the one in this portrait, engaged in daily chores or simply reclining in reverie. Demure and peaceful, the young woman ofis a lovely subject from the artist’s oeuvre. This work is also a particularly beautiful blend of realism and neo-classicism. The woman’s pose is reminiscent of a coy Venus sculpture, while her surroundings reference Greco-Roman and Italianate architecture. Her placement in this quiet alcove heightens the serenity and intimate nature of this scene. Salles-Wagner’s palette in The Young Mother is similarly inspired, as the inclusion of a rich blue swathe of fabric serves to contrast with the woman’s milky skin and the eponymous bouquet of pale flowers serves to feminize the subject further.

Jules Salles-Wagner was first a student of Numa Boucoiran at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Nimes, then of Paul Delaroche at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris. He enhanced this formal education by visiting museums in Venice, Rome, and Naples, a destination to which he often returned. Salles-Wagner was primarily a neoclassical genre and portrait painter. His paintings show the influence of the great French artist Ingres and often reference Raphael. He married the painter Adelaide Wagner around 1865 and added the last name of his wife to his own. An admirer of the more proven talent of his wife, Salles-Wagner sought to further his own artistic career as well as foster hers. To this effect, the couple entered into the competitive Parisian art world, living for a time in an old apartment atelier of Edouard Detaille. As a widower in l890, Salles-Wagner left Paris and returned to Nimes, where he bequeathed to a local museum nearly 100 of his wife’s paintings and watercolors as well as many of his own. Having always taken a part in the cultural life of his city, Salles-Wagner created a successful gallery in his name in 1894. Almost 100 years later (in 1983) le Musee de Nimes organized a complete retrospective of Salles-Wagner’s work, including sketches, watercolors, and oil paintings.

Museum Collections Include:
Musee de Bagnols, France; Musee de Carpentras, France; Musee de Nimes, France; Musee de La Rochelle, France

(Spanish, 1881-1973)

Couple Making Love (Couple faisant l’amour) from the Vollard Suite

1933

Etching and drypoint on paper

Edition: 260 (Printed by Lacouriere, Paris)

Dimensions: 7 ¾ x 10 15/16 inches

Signed lower right in pencil: Picasso

Literature: (B. 202; BA. 378)

Condition: Good.

The Vollard Suite is a set of 100 etchings in the neoclassical style by the Spanish artist Pablo Picasso, produced from 1930-1937. Named for the art dealer who commissioned them, Ambroise Vollard (1866-1939), the suite is in a number of museums, and individual etchings from the suite are collectible. Picasso worked extensively on the set in the spring of 1933, and completed the suite in 1937. It took a further two years for the printmaker Roger Lacourière to finish printing the 230 full sets, but the death of Vollard in 1939 and the Second World War meant that the sets only started coming onto the art market in the 1950s.

Richard Dorment claims that as Picasso took such a long time to create the suite, "the imagery and the emotional register of the prints constantly shifts to reflect Picasso's erotic and artistic obsessions, marital vicissitudes, and the darkening political situation in Europe...In the years Picasso worked on the series, fascism spread through Europe, and civil war erupted in Spain. These anxieties also found their way into the Vollard Suite, so that by the time you reach the end of the show and the last images of the blind minotaur, you feel that you are in a different emotional universe from the sunlit arcadia you encountered at the show’s beginning".