Displaying items by tag: French

On May 23, 2013, after a two and a half year renovation, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York unveiled 45 updated and expanded galleries of European paintings. The new space, which has increased by about a third, boasts 600 works of art dating from 1250 to 1800. Arranged in chronological order and grouped by country, the collection includes the Met’s renowned holdings of early Dutch, French, and Italian paintings.

The reimagined European painting galleries include 23 high profile loans, mainly from private collections. Works by Jan Van Eyck (1395-1441), Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665), Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510), and Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640) will be on view for at least six months thanks to the generosity of the Met’s trustees, and patrons.

The Met’s European painting galleries have not been fully renovated since the early 1950s and this is the first overall reinstallation of the collection since 1972.

Christie’s London will offer a Rococo coffee-pot by Paul de Lamerie (1688-1751), the most celebrated British silversmith of the 18^th century, as part of its Exceptional Sale on July 4, 2013. The George II silver coffee-pot, which was commissioned in 1738 by a wealthy London-based merchant, is expected to become the most valuable piece of English silver ever to be sold at auction. The masterpiece was recently the highlight of a British silver exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Lamerie, who began his career in 1703 as an apprentice to the London goldsmith, Pierre Platel (1659-1739), opened his own workshop in 1713 and was soon appointed goldsmith to George I. His work evolved from simple Queen Anne styles to classical French designs, but his ornate Rococo works of the 1730s are his most admired pieces. Lamerie’s illustrious clientele included Sir Robert Walpole, King John V of Portugal, and Queen Elizabeth II, who he made a wedding gift for.

The coffee-pot heading to auction in July is expected to garner approximately $4.5 million.

Thanks to the keen eyes of the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s curators, the institution snapped up an important Old Master drawing at an auction at Swann Galleries for $840 (with premium). The auction, which took place on January 29, 2013, was part of the highly anticipated Old Masters Week in New York.

The drawing was described in the auction catalogue as being from the early 19^th century and of French origin. An illustration in brush, black ink, and gray wash of Socrates dying, the drawing was said to be modeled after Jacques-Louis David’s (1748-1825) painting The Death of Socrates, a work that resides in the Met’s permanent collection. The original painting by David was acquired by the museum in 1931 and is among the artist’s greatest works.

As it turns out, the alleged copy, which was given an estimated selling price of $500-$700, was a previously unrecorded preliminary compositional study for David’s painting. Along with the painting, the Met owns a well-developed chalk drawing of The Death of Socrates, which helped the Met’s curators to authenticate the compositional drawing despite differences in setting, positions, and gestures of the figures featured in the painting.

The drawing was acquired by the museum via Katrin Bellinger, a frequent agent for the institution.

French president Francois Hollande has given special allowance to Édouard Manet’s (1832-1883) Olympia (1863), permitting the masterpiece to travel from Paris to Venice for an exhibition. It will be the first time the influential painting has left the French city since it was given to the nation in 1890. Olympia, which features a nude woman and her fully clothed maid, shocked audiences with its subject’s provocative gaze and the suggestion that she was a prostitute.  

Olympia, which is part of the Musée d’Orsay’s collection, will travel to Italy to anchor an exhibition at the Doge’s Palace in Venice. The painting will appear alongside Titian’s (1485-1576) The Venus of Urbino (1538), which is on loan from Florence’s Uffizi Gallery, as part of the exhibition Manet: Return to Venice. The exhibition features 70 works including 42 paintings by Manet on loan from the Musée d’Orsay, which will received a considerable amount in fees for the unprecedented loan. A number of paintings will also be on loan from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Manet: Return to Venice will explore how Italian artists such as Vittore Carpaccio (1460-1520), Antonello da Messina (1430-1479), and Lorenzo Lotto (1480-1556) influenced the French painter. The exhibition will be on view from April 25 to August 4, 2013.

French senator Corinne Bouchoux is urging French museum officials to take closer looks at their prized holdings as many public art collections contain works looted by Nazis during World War II. Bouchoux has led an investigative committee devoted to uncovering Nazi-looted artwork in France, which prompted her to ask museums to be more thorough in their provenance research.

Bouchoux revealed that out of the 100,000 artworks stolen from Jewish families in France and Belgium, approximately 2,000 of those works were still present in French museums. Many of these museums were designated “national museums of recovery,” which allowed the institutions to keep the works as long as they did not become property of the state and if identified, the rightful owners could reclaim them.

Bouchoux wrote her doctoral thesis, which has just been published as a book, on Nazi-looted art in France and has suggested nine proposals to direct the stolen works back to their rightful owners or offer restitution for them.

In line with Bouchoux’s efforts, the Shoal Memorial in Paris presents the exhibition Looting of the Jews: A State Policy (1940-44), which grants visitors a glimpse of the goods, including artworks, that originally belonged to Jews in France. The show is on view through September 29, 2013.

State Farm Insurance is suing French art dealer Alfred DeSimone for either discarding or losing an original lithograph by the colorful French artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901). The lost work, Artistide Bruant Dans Son Cabaret, 1893, was part of a series of three posters used to promote French cabaret singer and comedian Artistide Bruant (1851-1925) around Paris in the late 1800s. The lithograph remains one of Toulouse-Lautrec’s most recognizable images.

State Farm is seeking $103,000 in damages from DeSimone for the centuries-old lithograph, which was bought by the insurance company’s client, Thomas Rosensteel, in 2006. Rosensteel purchased the work as an investment, but never ended up hanging it. While looking for a buyer, Rosensteel gave the lithograph to DeSimone for safekeeping, agreeing to pay him a fee once the work was sold. Rosentsteel found a buyer in 2010 and when he went to pick up the work from DeSimone, it was missing. DeSimone claims that the lithograph may have been put in a mailing tube and either sent to someone else or discarded. Rosensteel filed an insurance claim with State Farm who paid $103,109 to him; the company is now seeking compensation for the claim.

DeSimone, who has been experiencing financial troubles, has not been charged with any criminal wrongdoing in the Toulouse-Lautrec case. A judge will review the lawsuit on April 25, 2013.

During the French Revolution, which lasted from 1789 to 1799, French troops took Flemish Baroque painter Peter Paul Rubens’ (1577-1640) The Triumph of Judas Maccabeus from the Tournai cathedral in Belgium. The work was whisked away to Paris and in 1801 it was sent to the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Nantes, France.

The Triumph of Judas Maccabeus is one half of a diptych that was commissioned for the cathedral by the bishop of Tournai in 1635. Napoleon’s army stole both The Triumph of Judas Maccabeus and its accompanying work, The Freeing of the Souls from Purgatory, which was returned to the cathedral in 1818.

Tournai officials are adamant about having the Rubens painting returned to the cathedral. Ruby Demotte, president of the French Community of Belgium, has penned a letter to French president Francois Hollande as well as to the French culture minister Aurélie Filippetti asking that the work be sent back to Belgium. Demotte made the same attempt last year but never received a response from the French government.

Tournai recently completed a major renovation of its cathedral and are hoping to finally reunite the two Rubens paintings.

Paris’ legendary Ritz hotel, which is currently undergoing a major $267.5 million renovation, has been unknowingly sheltering a 17^th century masterpiece. The work, which is believed to be by the French painter and court artist of Louis XIV, Charles Le Brun (1619-1690), was first spotted by Olivier Lefeuvre, a specialist in the period at Christie’s France. Upon seeing the painting in July, a month before the Ritz closed its doors for two years worth of renovations, Lefeuvre knew that the work had to be a Le Brun. Initials reading “CLBF,” which stands for Charles Le Brun Fecit (Le Brun did this) and a date, “1647,” were found on the work, supporting Lefeuvre’s hunch.  

How the painting ended up in the Ritz remains a mystery, as the hotel archives lack any reference to the work. While Christie’s has been unable to track down any record of the painting, officials have no doubt that the work is an authentic Le Brun. The painting, which depicts the killing of Trojan princess Polyxena after she was linked to the death of Achilles, was renamed The Sacrifice of Polyxena by Christie’s.

The Le Brun painting will be auctioned by Christie’s in Paris in April 2013 and could raise as much as $665,000 for the foundation established by owner Mohamed Al Fayed in memory of his son Dodi, the late boyfriend of Princess Diana. Dodi and Diana dined at the Ritz before their fatal car accident in 1997.

The painting will go on display at Christie’s New York location next week.

Manet: Portraying Life opens on January 26, 2013 at the Royal Academy of Arts in London. The first exhibition to focus solely on French Impressionist Edouard Manet’s (1832-1883) portraits, Portraying Life has already sold more advanced tickets than the museum’s blockbuster Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890) exhibition in 2010. Certain timed ticket entrances have sold out entirely.

The show, which took six years to organize, spans Manet’s entire career and features works from Europe, Asia, and the United States. Portraying Life is comprised of 50 paintings and a few pastels and includes portraits of Manet’s favorite sitters such as his wife, Suzanne Leenhoff (1829-1906), and luminaries from the time period including Antonin Proust (1832-1905) and Émile Zola (1840-1902). Manet, who often painted family, friends, and important political as well as artistic figures, invigorated scenes of everyday life with his modern and progressive approach to portraiture.

While Portraying Manet is expected to be a hit show, there has been a hiccup in plans. London’s snowy weather has left one painting stranded in Brazil’s São Paulo airport; the portrait of Mademoiselle Marie Lefébure is awaiting flight clearance before it can be exhibited at the Royal Academy. Sadly, the painting was not present at the press preview on January 22, 2013, which included VIP guests, patrons, and sponsors. Officials hope the work will arrive in time for exhibition’s public opening on Saturday.

Manet: Portraying Life will be on view through April 14, 2013.  

For the first time in the Louvre’s 220-year history, the search for a new chief for the museum may include non-French candidates. Public spending in France is being reduced by $13.4 billion this year and a candidate with expertise in international fundraising is crucial to the Louvre, which has led officials to broaden their search criteria. While French President Francois Hollande vowed not to cut cultural projects, the culture ministry’s budget was reduced by 2.3 percent for 2013.

The Louvre’s new director will be responsible for finding funds to expand the institution’s reception area; the area was built in the 1980s when the museum hosted 4 to 5 million visitors a year. The Louvre, the most visited museum in the world, now welcomes around 10 million visitors a year.

Talks regarding a new director for the Louvre began when the museum’s current chief, Henri Loyrette, announced his resignation on December 17, 2012. Hollande plans to have a new director in place when Loyrette’s twelve-year run at the helm of the institution ends in April.