Étienne MOREAU-NELATON (Paris, 1859 - Paris, 1927) THE... Lot 39

Étienne MOREAU-NELATON (Paris, 1859 - Paris, 1927) THE IMPERIAL OF THE OMNIBUS Early 1888 Oil on canvas Signed and dated lower left E. Moreau-Nélaton. 88. 64 x 80 cm Exhibitions - Exhibition of paintings, 1888, Paris, Cercle des Mirlitons (or Cercle de l'Union artistique) ; - Exhibition of the works of Etienne Moreau-Nélaton - Painter and ceramist (1859 - 1927), January 1928, N°7, Paris, Musée des Arts décoratifs, Pavillon de Marsan - Palais du Louvre. Provenance - Collection Dora Castro Bayley de Freccero (1900-1982) and Francisco F. Freccero (1897 - ?), Montevideo (Uruguay), Before 1931; - Sotheby's sale, London, 24 June 1987, Lot 248; - Sale Compagnie des commissaires-priseurs de l'Est, 14 February 1992; - Sotheby's sale, New York, 24 May 1995, Lot 256; - Sale Aste di Antiquariato Boetto, Genoa, 15 April 2002; - Swiss collection. Bibliography - Vincent Pomarède, Etienne Moreau-Nélaton - Un collectionneur peintre ou un peintre collectionneur, Paris, 1888, painting cited but not reproduced, p. 87-89. Son of Camille Nélaton (1840-1897), ceramist and painter, and Adolphe Moreau fils (1827-1882), State Councillor and collector. Fortunate and free of his choices - did he not shout to his fellow student at the École normale supérieure, Jean Jaurès, "I admit that my fortune is an injustice to the poor: tell me what I should do!" (Louis de Launay, Étienne Moreau-Nélaton, La Revue des Deux-Mondes, 1 June 1927) We know today that he found the answer with the three successive donations he made to the State and to the Louvre, which we will mention later. "Witty and mischievous attitudes linked to a daring technique are what make this first small masterpiece of his career so successful." Vincent Pomarède (born 1959), heritage curator and deputy general administrator of the Louvre Museum in Paris Painter, ceramist, poster artist, collector and art historian, at the age of 29 he produced this incredibly modern painting. Modernity first of all in the choice of his subject. If public transport has sometimes been represented by artists such as Monet or Renoir, it has been as a symbol of a booming industrial society. In contrast, Moreau-Nélaton wants to go further here and seeks to give his painting a naturalist orientation. A disciple of Degas, his figures are taken from life, captured in their everyday life. An amateur photographer since 1881, Moreau-Nélaton is therefore no stranger to this quasi-scientific desire to capture reality. Modernity, then, in the framing and technique. Beyond the impressionist touch inherited from the painters he loved so much and collected with fervour, we must point out the underlying Japonism of this painting. The asymmetry of the composition, the tight framing that partially cuts off the figure on the left and the low angle that negates the apparent banality of this scene are the markers of this oriental influence to which Moreau-Nélaton may have been made aware by his artist mother. GENRE SCENE OR COLLECTIVE PORTRAIT? For Vincent Pomarède, author of the most documented work on the painter, Moreau-Nélaton is said to have enjoyed "grouping various human or social types on his imperial: the chic and snobbish bourgeois woman stands next to a worker with a crooked cap, while a gentleman in a frock coat and top hat reads his newspaper. (op. cit., p. 89). We propose a more original hypothesis, following the example of Fantin-Latour (1836-1904), Moreau-Nélaton would have paid tribute to a group of painter friends, one of whom, Édouard Manet, had died at the time. From left to right we would have Édouard Manet (1832-1883), an artist whose identity remains to be discovered, Eugène Manet (1833-1892), who was married to Berthe Morisot (1841-1892), his neighbour in the centre of the painting, and Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901). In support of this proposition, we know that Moreau-Nélaton had shortly afterwards painted a group portrait of a group of musician friends gathered around a piano. It shows the composer Pierre de Bréville (1861-1949) playing the piano to accompany his friend Maurice Bagès (1862-1908), before Charles Koechlin (1867-1950), Paul Poujaud (1856-1936) and Rosa Bonheur (1822-1899). THE MANET CURSE: A PAINTING PROBABLY REFUSED AT THE 1888 SALON A wise collector, Moreau-Nélaton, had a collection (more description in lgne on kohn.paris)