RUPERT BUNNY Australian, 1864-1947

Lauraine Diggins Gallery, Melbourne, June 1986 (label on the reverse)

Private collection, Perth

Royal Society of British Artists, London, Winter 1903-04, cat. 216

Selected Australian Works of Art, Lauraine Diggins Gallery, Melbourne, 30 June - 11 July 1986, cat. 11, illus.

When Rupert Bunny arrived in Paris in 1886, the belle époque was at its height. Trained first in Melbourne and then under the French academic painter Jean Paul Laurens, Bunny soon achieved success with his large compositions and elegant portraits. Several of his works were purchased by the French government and he became the first Australian painter to receive an Honourable Mention at the Old Salon. 

During his summer holidays, as a change from formal figure subjects, Bunny travelled quite extensively in France to paint the landscape. The town of Cloyes-sur-le-Loir is situated close to both the Yerre Valley and the Aigre valley: the landscape that inspired the setting for Emile Zola’s 1886 novel The Earth. The town itself is dominated by the Château de Montigny-le-Gannelon. Bunny was probably there in the late summer of 1903 and exhibited the present work in London at the end of the year. Evening: near Cloyes is lighter than his landscapes prior to 1900, with more interest in atmosphere and changing effects of weather. Mary Eagle points out that Bunny showed another Cloyes subject, Fields near Cloyes, in Melbourne in 1911.

We are most grateful to both Mary Eagle and David Thomas for assistance in cataloguing this work.