Property from a Belgian Private Collection
Virginie Demont-Breton
Mélanie Ledet - Dune de West Wissant
Lot Closed
June 13, 01:54 PM GMT
Estimate
8,000 - 12,000 EUR
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Read more.Lot Details
Description
Virginie Demont-Breton
Courrières 1859 - 1935 Paris
Mélanie Ledet - Dune de West Wissant
Oil on panel
Signed lower left Virginie Demont-Breton; signed and titled on the reverse Virginie Demont Breton / Mélanie Lebet / Dune de West Wissant; dated and inscribed on a label on the reverse Wissant 26 7bre 1926 / A mes chers / Cousin et Cousine / Hubert et Claire / Olyff – De Vigne / à l’occasion de leur / mariage / affectueusement / Viriginie Demont-Breton
25,6 x 34,5 cm ; 10⅛ by 13⅝ in.
Offered by the artist as a wedding gift for Mr and Mrs Olyff, in 1926;
Thence by descent to the present owner.
Daughter and pupil of Jules Breton, Virginie married the landscape painter Adrien Demont. In 1881, they settled in Wissant, the village where the present painting was executed, according to an annotation handwritten by the artist.
Quickly achieving significant success among her contemporaries, Demont-Breton won several medals at the Salons and Expositions Universelles from 1880 onwards. Following in her father’s footsteps, she painted views of her immediate surroundings and used the inhabitants of the village as her models.
In this painting, the artist’s model was Mélanie Ledet, identified on the back of the painting. Positioned in the centre of the composition, she sits, seemingly pensive, at the top of the Wissant dune, overlooking the vast beach. Very simply portrayed, she demonstrates the artist’s directness and her overriding desire to depict the reality of ordinary life, rejecting idealization.
On another label, again on the back of the panel, Demont-Breton explains in a touching note that this was a wedding present for her cousins Olyff and De Vigne . This was her maternal cousin, niece of her mother Elodie de Vigne. Treasured in the same family ever since, the work has never before been seen by the public.