On December 12, 1903, Jean-Pierre Hoschedé (who became Claude Monet’s step-son when Monet wedded his mother Alice Hoschedé in 1892) married Suzanne Costadau at Monet’s home in Giverny. The host seemed to have left nothing up to chance for the wedding reception. This postcard, with a “Monsieur Claude Monet” header, shows again how much the […]
In 1899, while examining Edouard Manet’s Jeune femme voilée at the home of the collector Charles Deudon (1832–1914), Pierre-Auguste Renoir alluded to an “ugly veiled woman” without identifying her (letter dated February 5, 1899 to Paul Durand-Ruel). Renoir did not recognized his close friend Berthe Morisot, who had passed away three years earlier. Yet in
Who is this woman? Read More »
This family album comes from the archive of Paul Ferdinand Gachet (1828–1909), a French doctor, a collector and friend of Cézanne and Van Gogh, but also an amateur artist who painted under the pseudonym Paul Van Ryssel. The album was organized, annotated and augmented by his son Paul-Louis Gachet (1873–1962), a painter and sculptor who
Playing Guess Who in Paul Ferdinand Gachet’s Family Album Read More »
“These sketches are what he likes best, that’s where he puts all of himself, and deploys all of his audacity.” Albert André, 1925. It is by examining the photographs made from the glass plates found in the archives of Ambroise Vollard, one of Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s last dealers, that we can find a number of canvases
Renoir’s Fragments Read More »
Henri Rousseau’s “Aztec landscapes”are known to stir his viewers’ imagination thanks to their fascinating strangeness. But who knew that Rousseau also composed songs, piano pieces, compositions for orchestra, and received an award from the Académie littéraire et musicale de France for La Valse à Clémence, a violin piece he wrote as an homage to his
Henri “Le Douanier” Rousseau, the Unsung Composer Read More »
To this day, much remains to be uncovered on collaborationism, art looting, and the surprising boom in prices during the World War II art market. With the arrival of German buyers on the market, many art dealers attempted to turn a profit even if this meant sliding towards illegality. Belgian gallerist Raphaël Gérard was one
Art Dealings in Times of War: The Records of Raphaël Gérard Read More »
