Maurice de Vlaminck

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Description

Maurice de Vlaminck
LES PÊCHEURS
signed Vlaminck and dated 1907 (lower left)
oil on canvas
60 by 73cm.
23 5/8 by 28 3/4 in.

Provenance

Sale: Hôtel Drouot, Paris, 27th February 1928, lot 166
Private Collection, Paris (acquired circa 1934)
Thence by descent to the present owner

Exhibited

Paris, Galerie Charpentier, L'Oeuvre de Vlaminck, du Fauvisme à nos jours, 1956, no. 30
Chartres, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Vlaminck. Le peintre et la critique, 1987, no. 13, illustrated in colour in the catalogue
São Paulo, Museu de Arte Brasileira, Armando Alvares Penteado, Vlaminck, 2001, no. 6, illustrated in the catalogue

Literature

Maurice Genevoix, Vlaminck. L'Homme et l'oeuvre, Paris, 1954, illustrated in colour opposite p. 51 (titled Pêcheurs à Chatou and as dating from 1908)
Marcel Sauvage, Vlaminck. Sa vie et son message, Geneva, 1956, illustrated pl. 57 (titled Les Pêcheurs à Villesne)

Catalogue Note

Painted in 1907, Les Pêcheurs exemplifies the exuberant colours and bold brushwork that characterised the Fauve movement. The Fauves reacted against the mild-mannered lyricism of the Impressionists, arguing that painting should centre around the creative act of applying pigment to the canvas. Fauvism was according to Matisse, 'the result of a necessity within one, not a voluntary attitude arrived at by deduction or reasoning, it was something only painting can do' (Sarah Whitfield, Fauvism, London, 1996, p. 9).

This work encapsulates the manner in which the Fauves undermined Impressionist ideals of the picturesque. Vlaminck's vigorous painting technique changes a peaceful, typically Impressionist scene into a maelstrom of primary colours. The placid surface of the river is transformed by his short attenuated brushwork into a turbulent, kinetic body of water, and the bold greens of the trees used to frame the central figures is a typical Fauve compositional device. The thick primary colours and heavily-worked surface combine to transform this otherwise typical landscape into a violent, wild scene, almost at odds with the nature of the subject.

This work has been requested for the Vlaminck exhibition to be held at the Musée du Luxembourg, Paris from February to July 2008.