French, 1870-1950
French painter, illustrator and stage designer, disdaining the traditional art schools, Georges D’Espagnat studied part-time at the Académie Colarossi in Paris under Gustave-Claude-Etienne Courtois and Jean-André Rixens but was mostly self-taught. In 1891, he exhibited at the Salon des Refusés and the following year at the Salon des Indépendants. His early works showed a strong debt to Impressionism. He was a friend of Renoir as well as of Paul Signac, Henri Edmond Cross, Louis Valtat and later Maurice Denis, Bonnard and Vuillard.
After his return to France, from a visit to Morocco in 1898, he concentrated on studies from nature, paintings of women, children and flowers and decorative projects for private patrons. In 1904 he exhibited at the Salon d’Automne, becoming its Vice-President in 1935. In 1906 he illustrated Remy de Gourmont’s book Sixtine, published in Paris. In the early 1910s he painted a number of portraits including several musician friends, including Albert Roussel, by this time his work was more simplified, fluid and intimate. In 1914 he provided the decor for a production of Alfred de Musset’s play Fantasio at the Théâtre de Batignolles in Paris.
After working in a camouflage unit during World War I, d’Espagnat bought a country house in the Quercy region and over the next decade painted numerous landscapes and interiors there. During the 1930s he worked in various media. He illustrated Alphonse Daudet’s L’Immortel (Paris, 1930) and also produced theatre designs. Ironically, considering his earlier attitudes, from 1936 to 1940 he was a professor at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Though disrupted by World War II, he continued to paint until his death and with his pupil Suzanne Humbert, illustrated Francis Jammes’s Clairières dans le ciel, 1902–1906.
French, 1911-1993
Provenance:
Kunstaus Lempertz, Cologne, 1986
Galerie Larock- Granoff, Paris
Private collection, Northern France
Exhibitions:
Exposition International, Carnegie Institute, Pittsburg, 1958
Galerie de France, December 4, 1958 - February 1959
For Alfred Manessier, the variety of techniques which he utilised, as well as the diverse inspirations and themes led to the breaking off point of his global project, that which he called his "passages".
Our painting corresponds to the beginning period of his long stays in Moissac-Bellevue, in Haut-Provence, where he perceived an implacable light which prompted a state of exalted work. These paintings, inspired by the geological rhythms of the eroded mountains, became the object of a Parisian exhibition on the artist in 1959.
It was painted upon his return from Caen in the North of France. Having belonged to French and German collections, this picture was presented at the World's Fair Exhibition at the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburg in the winter of 1958.
The composition, structured by a solid cubist grill, reflects the great chromatic richness of the oeuvre of Alfred Manessier.
The work of Manessier blossoms from the moment where he discovers the necessity to consecrate himself to non figurative painting. Close to abstract art, it is preferable to qualify his painting as non figurative.
Manessier's work is in effect profoundly anchored in reality, even if that reality is elusive. They are never gratuitous constructions; always organized based on references which are more or less explicit, such as places, political events, meditations on sacred texts.
Profoundly imprinted from his childhood memories of the landscapes and the light of his native region and the Bay of Somme, in the late 1940's and 1950's, he dedicated numerous canvases to the meandering reflecting rivers in the ports of Normandy, with a great sensitivity to nature,
The artist was equally an important contributor to the movement "art sacre", during the second half of the twentieth century, which aspired to bring "living art" into the scope of the modern church building, and was based on the premise that much 19th century church decoration was outdated. In this spirit, the artist created the stained glass windows for the church of Sainte-Agathe des Bréseux (1948) -the first non figurative designs to be incorporated in an ancient building. Stained glass holds a significant place in the artistic production of Alfred Manessier, having first been introduced to the technique by Georges Rouault.
The work of Manessier was recognized by international prizes. Selected pour the Bienalle of Venice in 1950, he was awarded the Grand Prix for painting in 1962, the same year that Giacometti received the Grand Prix pour sculpture. Manessier was the last French painter to be so recognized, after Matisse, Jacques Villon and Raoul Dufy.
In 1953, he received the Premier Prix for painting at the Bienalle of Sao Paolo, and in 1955, the Grand Prix for painting at the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburg.
