Ferdinand du Puigaudeau

Comte Amédée de Vincelles (commissioned directly from the artist for the Château de Penanrun in Trégunc in 1896)
Private Collection, London 
Sale: Christie's, London, October 12, 2000, lot 27
Acquired at the above sale

Pont-Aven, Musée de Pont-Aven & Morlaix, Musée des Jacobins, Ferdinand du Puigaudeau, 1998-99

Antoine Laurentin, Ferdinand du Puigaudeau (1864-1930), vol. I, Paris, 1989, no. 14, illustrated p. 255

The canvas is unlined. There is light craquelure along the vertical stretcher and to the right side of the composition. Some isolated minor paint shrinkage to the blue paint tones of skirt of the left foreground figure. Further paint shrinkage to the blue tones of the skirt of the left-most foreground figure. When examined under UV light, there is evident of repainting in the cream tones of both spandrels. There is a vertical line of retouching, approx. 9 in. long, at the skirt of the central foregrounded figure. Further vertical line of retouching, approx. 4 in. long, to the red lantern. There is minor additional scattered retouching to the ground in the foreground of the composition. There is some surface dirt, most notably to the lower right quadrant.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
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A demonstration of Puigaudeau’s adeptness at conveying the spellbinding effects of light, Bretonnes aux lampions à Pont-Aven presents what is arguably the artist’s most important motif, the Breton community in the midst of religious ceremony. After travelling to Italy and Tunisia as a young man and teaching himself how to paint, Puigaudeau made his way to the artist’s community of Pont-Aven in Brittany. Upon befriending Paul Gauguin, who invited him to Martinique and Panama, Puigaudeau was drafted into the French military. While he did not have the chance to experience the exotic with Gauguin, he adopted many tenants of the Pont-Aven style into his own work, including his bold use of color, Symbolist subject matter and idealization of the charming local cultural customs. Breton girls, with rosy cheeks and grinning smiles, seemingly process outside of the composition with their traditional glowing gas lamps, presumably in celebration of a Catholic festival. Such rituals would have been the cornerstone of their “naïve” lives, which had been become fascinating to tourists and outsiders in the wake of the opening of the railroad line from Paris to Quimper just four years earlier in 1862.  

Commissioned for the Château de Penanrun by the Comte Amédée de Vincelles, this work related to the Vincelles' interest in the agrarian nature of Brittany. Elegant yet rustic, the family home functioned as a farm and a grand residence for entertaining, speaking to their love of the region and celebrating the traditional way of life. After the Comte's death in 1912, the Château was maintained by his wife who welcomed wounded soldiers to the sprawling residence over the course of World War I.