Louis Abel Lauvray
Rome, l'Arc De Titus

About the Item

Abel LAUVRAY (1870-1950) Rome, the Arch of Titus Oil on cardboard mounted on canvas Size: 48 x 65 cm Signed lower right Painting in good condition. A few fine cracks without lifting of the pictorial layer. (Visible on the photos) Provenance: - Galerie Yves Jaubert - Sale Atelier Lauvray, Ader, 2009 Painting registered and reproduced in the catalogue raisonné of the work of Abel Lauvray under the number: 9 page 35. Sold with invoice and certificate of authenticity Fast and careful shipping Abel Lauvray was born in 1870 to a family of wealthy Norman notaries and everything seemed to destiny him for this "hereditary" function if fate had not decided otherwise. In this circumstance, destiny took the form of a young romantic and innovative painter, much criticized by journalists and art lovers in Europe: Claude Monet. To properly situate this period which is that of the birth of impressionism, it is necessary to remember that the Second Empire had just fallen and the Third Republic was born. The atmosphere was one of change. A small group of painters: MONET, CEZANNE, DEGAS, RENOIR, GUILLAUMIN and PISSARRO did not support the yoke of classicism. They had another conception of color and light and with alas! limited means, they tried to make it known. Little Abel LAUVRAY was nine years old, when one of them, Claude MONET, came to settle in Vétheuil, in a small house, a few meters from the LAUVRAY estate, a beautiful 18th century residence, which was their favorite place to stay. The "Master of Impressionism" often came to set up his easel in front of the "LAUVRAY" terrace, from which there is a beautiful view of the magnificent 13th century church which is the pride of this beautiful city, nestled in the hills bordering a large loop of the Seine and placed there like a jewel in a case. MONET's time in Vétheuil corresponds to the darkest period of his life. He could not sell his works and fell into great poverty. He lost his wife Camille and had to provide for his two children: Jean and Michel. The LAUVRAY family did not remain indifferent to the fate of their new neighbor. They lent him money and commissioned him to paint the portrait of the youngest son André. MONET was not forgetful and when he returned in 1893 to paint his famous series of 70 paintings of Vétheuil on his boat-studio, his first visit was for his friends. Young Abel had the great joy of being able to accompany the Master and see under his agile fingers, these marvelous landscapes being born, transformed there, on a piece of canvas by a few strokes of magic brushes, radiating a light with multiple tones that only the prophets of the New School knew how to perceive and render: the Impressionists. Abel LAUVRAY was conquered, he had faith, he would be a painter and nothing, not even the After having studied law in Paris, a concession to his family, he enrolled at the Cormon Academy of Painting and always on the advice of MONET, began to paint by himself. (?) MONET having subsequently given him his boat-studio, LAUVRAY in turn traveled the Seine from Vétheuil to Mantes and tirelessly, brought back home a significant quantity of canvases that are estimated at around 1500 and which represent his 60 years of active pictorial life. Reading these lines, one might believe that this painter was a follower, if not a copier of MONET and the Impressionists, his friends. This is not the case, as Claude ROGER MARX acknowledges: "Even when LAUVRAY deals with subjects identical to those of MONET, sits in the place that the latter had chosen and paints at the same times, however close he often is to the one he has taken as his master, he shows a rather different temperament. Pierre CABANNE confirms this in one of his prefaces: "No one has indoctrinated him, he remains free, loving to express the things that surround him, but as he understands, according to his own pleasure?". LAUVRAY was free from need and therefore independent. He owned several properties. In Mantes, he also inherited a sumptuous villa in the park of which was his studio, an exact replica of Claude MONET's studio in Giverny. Unfortunately, at the liberation, this villa was requisitioned by the general staff of General ROHMEL, the studio destroyed and about 500 canvases burned. He also traveled a lot and several paintings bear witness to his landscapes in Venice, Syracuse, Athens, etc. so that his work is topographically quite varied. Gérald SCHURR, analyzes LAUVRAY's work thus: "If the vaporous and quivering quality of the light indeed makes him similar to the Master of the "Water Lilies", his nervous and solidly refined touch distances him from him, his conception remains more classical in the composition, in the arrangement of the masses. He excels in half-tones, in the modulated lighting of the undecided hours, from dawn to dusk: a kind of chamber music comparable to certain harmonies of Camille PISSARRO; the example of MONET and also that of the "Barbizonnais" bathe his landscapes in a tone of gravity. Over the years, the touch becomes lighter and lighter, the impastos die little by little in fluid touches"? In summary, (?) LAUVRAY is a "painter witness of his time". Touched by the Barbizon School, acquired to impressionism, indifferent to cubism and surrealism, attracted at the end of his life by expressionism to the limit of the abstract, his work remains uniform. His landscapes are an in-depth study of light whose reflections are found in the water of the Seine and the Rhône. His skies with brilliant and fleeting clouds, which pleased MONET, are remarkable. LAUVRAY is a Master full of delicacy, charm and finesse. The sweetness of life, the calm, the silence emerge from its united landscapes.

Creator:

Louis Abel Lauvray (1870 - 1950)

Dimensions:

Height: 18.9 in (48 cm)Width: 25.6 in (65 cm)Depth: 0.79 in (2 cm)

Medium:

Canvas,Oil,Cardboard

Movement & Style:

Impressionist

Period:

Early 20th Century

Condition:

Gallery Location: