VŨ CAO ĐÀM (1908-2000)

Maternité, 1944 Ink and color on silk, signed and dated lower right 60 x 46,4 cm - 23 5/8 18 1/4 in. Born in 1908 in Hanoi, Vũ Cao Đàm came from a large, Catholic and well-off. He was immersed in French culture from his childhood. His father, Vu Dinh Thi (1864 - 1930), a great scholar, who his sculptures, fine and graceful, for which he has many commissions. He exhibited them at the gallery l’Art Français in Paris but also at the Salon des Indépendants, the Salon des Tuileries and the not only mastered the French language but was also a proven Francophile. Indeed, sent to Paris by the Vietnamese government for the occasion of the 1889 World’s Fair, he was won over by the French lifestyle. It is therefore not surprising that Vũ Cao Đàm joined the Hanoi School of Fine Arts in 1926. There, he studied drawing, painting and sculpture under the authority of Victor Tardieu, founder of the School, and Joseph Inguimberty. He graduated in 1931 and obtained a scholarship that allowed him to continue his training in France. After presenting his sculptures at the 1931 International Colonial Exhibition, he decided to settle permanently in France. He then continued his artistic development by rubbing shoulders with all the greatest European masterpieces such as the works of Renoir, Van Gogh, Bonnard and Matisse but also the creations of Rodin, Despiau and Giacometti which particularly inspired him. He is also influenced by Western avant-gardes such as Fauvism and the Paris School, whose imprint can be seen in his work. In 1946, the artist already enjoys great recognition mainly for Salon d’Automne of which he has been a member since 1943. Parallel to sculpture, he also paints on silk. In 1949, Vũ Cao Đàmdecided to leave for the South of France and settled with his family at the villa Les Heures Claires near Saint-Paul-de-Vence, just next to the Matisse chapel and only one kilometer from Marc Chagall’s residence, La Colline. The light and the atmosphere of the South of France mark him and can be found in the works of this period. As early as the 1960s, the artist exhibited internationally, notably in London at the Frost & Reed gallery, but also in Brussels before signing an exclusive contract with the art dealer Wally Findlay in the United States. Today, Vũ Cao Đàm is considered as one of the greatest Vietnamese painters and sculptors of his time and his paintings are part of the permanent collections of many museums around the world such as the Quai Branly Museum in Paris. Motherhood, a universal language, represents one of Vũ Cao Đàm’s favorite themes, a subject the artist always treats with sensitivity and delicacy. Here, the artist pays tribute to the bond between mother and child, choosing to illustrate the special moment of breastfeeding. While this theme, present since ancient Egyptian times - through statuettes of Isis breast-feeding her son Horus - has accompanied the history of art throughout its evolution, it has remained rare in Asia. While the Virgin Mary and the Infant Jesus adorn religious statuary and iconography, the breast-feeding woman is also a subject that recurs regularly in Western scenes of daily life. Inmodern painting, for example, Renoir, Picasso and Mary Cassatt exalt the mother-child bond, regardless of social class. However, the subject recurs much more rarely in Asia than in Europe. This painting, created in 1944 by Vũ Cao Đàm, is one of the rare examples. In this maternity, pastel tones bring softness and tranquility, and reinforce a naturalness and soothing underlined by the vegetal décor, in which the scene is set. This work, produced more than 10 years after the painter’s arrival in France, expresses a talent in full maturity. It is rich in a perfect mastery of the precepts received by the young artist at the fine arts school in Hanoi, at the École du Louvre and through visits to museums. With this perfectly balanced composition and delicate treatment, Vũ Cao Đàm appears at the peak of his art.