Georges d'Espagnat

Private Collection, France

Born in Melun in 1870, Georges d’Espagnat shunned the traditional art establishments of his day: he claimed to have spent only four hours at the Ecole de Beaux-Arts, preferring instead to study works in the Louvre and attending classes at the free Academy.

Influenced by the French Impressionists and a close friend of Renoir, Signac, Denis, Bonnard and Vuillard, d’Espagnat exhibited at the Salon des Refusés in 1891, the Salon des Indépendants in 1892, and in the Impressionist and Symbolist exhibitions held at Le Parc de Bonteville in 1894 and 1895.

These Impressionist and Symbolist beginnings are manifested in the present work in its harmonious deployment of colour and subtle application of paint. While the artist was inspired by the classicism of Pierre Puvis de Chavannes' version of Le Repos, he used an energetic Impressionist palette to render the figures and the background. The contrast between the daring colors of the background, which prefigure the palette used by the Fauve artists, and softness of the foreground, creates a striking composition.