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Albert CLOUARD (1866-1952) The mermaids Circa 1905 / 1906 Oil on canvas, signed lower right 81 x 65 cm EXHIBITIONS : Paris, Salon des Indépendants, 1906 Sale Atelier Albert Clouard. Rennes, December 9, 1990, catalog no. 19. BIBLIOGRAPHY : Bruno Belleil, Albert Clouard, Les derniers feux du symbolisme en Bretagne, Rennes, Ouest-France, 1992, reproduction page 99. PROVENANCE : Private Collection "We remember the sale of the Albert Clouard (1866-1952) studio in Rennes in 1990, when we discovered the existence of this virtually unknown painter nicknamed by Maurice Denis "the clandestine nabi", and a body of work remarkable for its Breton sources of inspiration and technique, placing him between the symbolists and the nabis. A lawyer from Rennes who became a poet and literary critic, Clouard frequented Symbolist and Bretonist circles in Paris. He had been drawing since he was a teenager, and began painting as a self-taught artist. In Perros-Guirec, where he made his home, he met Maurice Denis in 1897, who became his greatest friend. Through Denis, he met and became close to Paul Sérusier. Both encouraged him to paint and to make his work known, even though he had no ambition and tended to live as a recluse. Clouard found the landscapes of Perros-Guirec and the surrounding area the ideal backdrop for a host of themes, ranging from the legendary to everyday life. Having rented a cottage on the port of Ploumanach in 1903, he was familiar with the site of the Squevel rock, one of the jewels in the crown of the pink granite coast. He used it for various evocations, such as a bathing scene, a "Virgin of the Shores", mermaids trying to attract sailors, or landscapes. These surprisingly shaped rocks provide an unusual backdrop for a bathing scene in which the painter lines up seven naked women playing in the sea or standing on the rocks (Les Baigneuses, private collection). Clouard takes up the theme and site for a depiction of mermaids. He modifies the composition, placing himself above the rocks and waves and concentrating on the cove. This allows him to eliminate the horizon and sky and use the rocky masses above and below as a backdrop. A boat under sail at top left rounds the rocky headland to answer the calls of a naiad who has launched herself into the waves and is beckoning to the sailors. On either side of the cove, two groups of two naked women, bathers, observe the scene and converse. This may suggest that Clouard wanted to invert the traditional myth. The mermaid doesn't lure sailors to their doom, but rather saves them from the evils of civilization. The cove and the women symbolize a paradise on earth. But this theme is also a pretext for the nudes in the foreground, reminiscent of Maurice Denis. This first group also enables him to guide the viewer's gaze along a diagonal from bottom right to top left. The simplified rock masses are painted in an almost uniform pattern of small patches, with no volume or shadow effects. The rendering of the water in the foreground is reminiscent of the art of Japanese wood engravers, with its juxtaposition of colored patches encircled by the white of foam. With subtlety, Clouard uses the pink reflections of the rocks in the sea to link the different parts of his composition. We know of a small preparatory study, 34.5 by 25 cm (sale Rennes, Bretagne enchères, December 7, 2009, lot 117). The comparison shows how much work Clouard put into fine-tuning his composition, in particular the layout of the large diagonal, which corresponds plastically to the symbolic theme of call and attraction. Since the work's discovery in 1990, Bruno Belleil's book has shed light on the rich, singular personality of Albert Clouard, a talented "fellow traveler" of the Nabis, as this painting shows." André Cariou

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Albert CLOUARD (1866-1952) The mermaids Circa 1905 / 1906 Oil on canvas, signed lower right 81 x 65 cm EXHIBITIONS : Paris, Salon des Indépendants, 1906 Sale Atelier Albert Clouard. Rennes, December 9, 1990, catalog no. 19. BIBLIOGRAPHY : Bruno Belleil, Albert Clouard, Les derniers feux du symbolisme en Bretagne, Rennes, Ouest-France, 1992, reproduction page 99. PROVENANCE : Private Collection "We remember the sale of the Albert Clouard (1866-1952) studio in Rennes in 1990, when we discovered the existence of this virtually unknown painter nicknamed by Maurice Denis "the clandestine nabi", and a body of work remarkable for its Breton sources of inspiration and technique, placing him between the symbolists and the nabis. A lawyer from Rennes who became a poet and literary critic, Clouard frequented Symbolist and Bretonist circles in Paris. He had been drawing since he was a teenager, and began painting as a self-taught artist. In Perros-Guirec, where he made his home, he met Maurice Denis in 1897, who became his greatest friend. Through Denis, he met and became close to Paul Sérusier. Both encouraged him to paint and to make his work known, even though he had no ambition and tended to live as a recluse. Clouard found the landscapes of Perros-Guirec and the surrounding area the ideal backdrop for a host of themes, ranging from the legendary to everyday life. Having rented a cottage on the port of Ploumanach in 1903, he was familiar with the site of the Squevel rock, one of the jewels in the crown of the pink granite coast. He used it for various evocations, such as a bathing scene, a "Virgin of the Shores", mermaids trying to attract sailors, or landscapes. These surprisingly shaped rocks provide an unusual backdrop for a bathing scene in which the painter lines up seven naked women playing in the sea or standing on the rocks (Les Baigneuses, private collection). Clouard takes up the theme and site for a depiction of mermaids. He modifies the composition, placing himself above the rocks and waves and concentrating on the cove. This allows him to eliminate the horizon and sky and use the rocky masses above and below as a backdrop. A boat under sail at top left rounds the rocky headland to answer the calls of a naiad who has launched herself into the waves and is beckoning to the sailors. On either side of the cove, two groups of two naked women, bathers, observe the scene and converse. This may suggest that Clouard wanted to invert the traditional myth. The mermaid doesn't lure sailors to their doom, but rather saves them from the evils of civilization. The cove and the women symbolize a paradise on earth. But this theme is also a pretext for the nudes in the foreground, reminiscent of Maurice Denis. This first group also enables him to guide the viewer's gaze along a diagonal from bottom right to top left. The simplified rock masses are painted in an almost uniform pattern of small patches, with no volume or shadow effects. The rendering of the water in the foreground is reminiscent of the art of Japanese wood engravers, with its juxtaposition of colored patches encircled by the white of foam. With subtlety, Clouard uses the pink reflections of the rocks in the sea to link the different parts of his composition. We know of a small preparatory study, 34.5 by 25 cm (sale Rennes, Bretagne enchères, December 7, 2009, lot 117). The comparison shows how much work Clouard put into fine-tuning his composition, in particular the layout of the large diagonal, which corresponds plastically to the symbolic theme of call and attraction. Since the work's discovery in 1990, Bruno Belleil's book has shed light on the rich, singular personality of Albert Clouard, a talented "fellow traveler" of the Nabis, as this painting shows." André Cariou

Estimate 30 000 - 50 000 EUR

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