Gaston Sebire
At The Seaside
1965

Name: At The Seaside
Brand: Gaston Sebire
Price: 6960 USD
Availability: InStock

About the Item

Gaston Sebire French, 1920-2002 At The Seaside Oil on canvas 25 by 31 in. W/frame 33 ½ by 39 ½ in. Signed lower right Gaston Sebire (1920 – 2002) Gaston Sebire, was one of Europe’s leading landscapists, was born in the village of Saint-Samson in Normandy in 1920. A self taught artist, he began to paint seriously at the age of eighteen. For eight years he worked as a postal clerk in the Rouen, sorting letters at night in order to support his career as a painter. In 1952 Gaston Sebire had his first exhibition at the Galerie Gosselin in Paris. The following years he enjoyed the double triumph of winning both the coveted Prix de la Critique and the Prix Casa Velasquez. The Latter award made it possible for him to spend a year and a half in Spain. Of this formative period he said, “They were my first, wonderful years without worry. For fifteen years I had never known what the next day would bring.” The year 1957 marked another important stage in his career. His painting “La Dinde” won the Greenshields Prize in a field of 136 competitors, making it possible for him to paint for another two years without the worry of finances. Winning the awards naturally drew public attention to the artist from Normandy, and his works were presented in highly successful one-man shows in Paris. Sebire was a Norman, a man strongly attached to the soil, and after his exhibitions in Paris, he returned to Rouen to his large house overlooking the town and once again plunged into painting the countryside. Gaston Sebire was a strongly built man with square hands and a rather heavy walk. He had immense vitality, and used that to his advantage. As he said of himself, “When the snow falls, I can’t stay indoors. I set out with my paint box. I paint outdoors from nine in the morning until five at night. If it were only a question of money, one could just as well paint in one’s own room.” But Sebire went into the countryside, or into the village, and sets up his easel. When there is a café into which people are going; there is a fence, a telegraph pole, a few buildings in the background. The scene takes on life, vivid life, with a sense of some event about to take place in the scene. Like many artists, and like a typical Norman, Sebire was silent and solitary by nature, with a personality as strong and frank as his paintings. A painting, he says, “must have an element of mystery, show an effort to look beyond the aura surface of things.” Sebire’s early paintings were somber with much use of black and white tones. In 1970 he turned to colour. The subtle light of the Normandy skies; the shifting light and color along the seacoast; the magnificent blues of the Rouen pottery in which he had often places the flowers he paints, pointing up vivid tones with gray backgrounds — all these give free range to his colorful palette. In the canvases there is an interplay of color which allows certain tones to flash like gold-dust in a stream, or like a miniature fireworks display. But the solid sense of construction developed in his earlier, darker canvases remained as the firm underpinning of his mature work. The art critic Pierre Imbourg summed up Sebire’s paintings, noting, “He shows us the profound richness of life and nature. His still lifes, his flowers, his marines filled with strength and sobriety, are all overflowing with eloquence.” Gaston Sebire exhibits regularly in Paris, Germany, England and in the United States. (at Wally Findlay Galleries since 1965 ) and also regularly in Paris in the Salon D’Automne, the Salon des Independants, and the Salon de Tuileries which in recent years has been known as the Ecole de Paris. American collectors have accepted his work with enthusiasm. One of his paintings has been purchased by the University of Wisconsin for its permanent collection. Both a realist and a visionary, Sebire was part of the reaction against the long dominance of Cubism and abstract art. His work marked a return to figurative painting which has vitality, imagination and beauty. Provenance: Wally Findlay Galleries Private Collection New York Le Trianon Fine Art & Antiques Art S125 $6,500

Creator:

Gaston Sebire (1920 - 2001, French)

Creation Year:

1965

Dimensions:

Height: 33.5 in (85.09 cm)Width: 39.5 in (100.33 cm)Depth: 2 in (5.08 cm)

Medium:

Oil

Movement & Style:

Post-Impressionist

Period:

1960-1969

Condition:

Gallery Location:

Sheffield, MA

Reference Number:

Seller: Art S1251stDibs: LU70037010702

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Gaston Sebire

Gaston Sébire was born August 18, 1920, in Saint-Samson Calvados Normandy. He was known for his landscapes, seascapes, still lifes and flowers. Sebire was also an engraver, pastel artist and painter of theatre decorations. He settled in Paris in 1951 and in 1953 he created the costumes and decorations for l'Ange Gris, with music by Debussy, for the Ballets of the Marquis de Cuevas. He lived and worked in Normandy and participated in numerous group exhibitions, including Salon of Independents, Paris Salon of Tuileries, Paris Comparisons Salon since 1962, Paris Salon of French Artists since 1964, Paris. He appeared at other groupings in London with Lorjou and Clave, in Munich, Washington, Japan, and different exhibitions of the School of Paris at the Charpentier Gallery in Paris in 1953, 1954, 1955, 1956, 1946, 1958 and 1962, at the Biennial of the Jeunes au Pavilon of Marsan in 1957. He received the Critic's Prize in 1953, the Greenshields Prize in 1957 and the Gold Medal at the Salon of French Artists in 1968. His first major achievement was to design the costumes and sets for L'Ange gris, a ballet by Claude Debussy for the Marquis de Cuevas in 1953. That same year, he won the Casa de Velázquez in Madrid, of which he was a member of the 24th artistic promotion, and leaves for Spain. And during the entire second half of the twentieth century, he exhibited in the main Parisian salons, and was notably part of Maurice Boitel's group at Comparisons show, for forty-five years. Today his work can be seen in Museums around the world and among his shows and exhibitions include: 1944 Galerie Gosselin in Rouen, France; 1952 Galerie Visconti in Paris, France; 1956 Galerie Charpentier in Paris, France; 1961 Galerie Combes in Clermont-Ferrand, France; 1962 Galerie Drouant in Paris, France; 1964 "Exhibition" Musee de Rouen in Rouen, France; 1965 Wally Findlay Gallery in New York and Chicago; 1965 Galerie Drouant in Paris, France; 1965 Wally Findlay Gallery in Paris, France; 1968 Galerie Drouant in Paris, France; 1971 Wally Findlay Gallery in Paris, France; 1976 "Exhibitions" Cultural Center in Le Mesnil-Esnard, France; 1986 "Retrospective" Museum of Fine Art in Rouen, France; 1991 Roger Worms Association with "Cacheux" in Ville de Montfermeil, France and in 1992 Wally Findlay Gallery in Paris, France. Gaston Sébire was appointed painter of the Navy in 1973 and he became a member of the Rouen Academy in 1973. Sébire died in 2001.