CAMILLE PISSARRO (1830-1903) Les peupliers, après-midi à Eragny Signed and dated 99 Oil on canvas 28 3/4 X 36 1/4 in.
PROVENANCE: Galerie Durand-Ruel, Paris (acquired from the artist, November 27, 1899). The Henry Zimet Foundation (sale : Sotheby’s London, October 23 , 1963, lot 8). Acquavella Galleries, Inc., New York (acquired at the above sale). Acquired from the above November 5, 1963. EXHIBITED: Paris, Galerie Durand-Ruel, C. Pissarro, 1901, no.24. Manchester, Manchester City Art Gallery, Modern French Paintings, 1907, no. 65. Paris, Galerie Durand-Ruel, Tableaux et Gouaches de Camille Pissarro, 1910, no. 15. New York, Metropolitain Museum of Art, Summer Loan Exhibition, 1962, no. 6. LITERATURE: A.Basler and Charles Kunstler, La Peinture Indépendante en France, Paris, 1929, illustrated. Ludovic Rodo Pissarro and Lionello Venturi, Camille Pissarro, son art-son œuvre, Paris, 1939, vol . I, p. 230, no. 1073 ; vol. II, pl. 215, no. 1073.
Camille Pissarro was born in 1830 on the Caribbean island of St. Thomas. He lived in St. Thomas until the age of twelve, when his parents sent him to boarding school in Paris. After completing his primary education, he returned to St. Thomas where he took up drawing in his free time. At this time he was particularly attracted to themes of political anarchy. In 1852 he traveled to Venezuela with the Danish artist Fritz Melbye, and eventually returned to Paris in 1855 to study art at the Ecole de Beaux Arts as well as the Academie Suisse. During this time, he studied under Gustave Courbet, who is considered Pissarro’s earliest and most significant influence. In the Salon catalogues of 1864 and 1865, Pissarro would list himself as Courbet’s pupil. Pissarro’s early works are characterized by broadly painted, sometimes with a palette knife, naturalism that illustrate Courbet’s influence but do so with an incipient Impressionist palette. At the end of the 1860s he moved to Louveciennes, where he worked in close proximity to Claude Monet, Pierre Auguste Renoir and Alfred Sisley. It was here that he began to revise his technique, employing smaller patches of paint and giving color a more dominant role in his expression of nature. In 1874, he participated in the first Impressionist exhibition. Pissarro and Edgar Degas were the only artists to show at all eight of the Impressionist exhibitions. In 1885 Pissarro opened himself up to new influences, meeting both Paul Signac and Georges Seurat, who were experimenting with Divisionist techniques. Pissarro investigated Pointillism, which he deemed “scientific Impressionism,” but eventually returned to his original Impressionist style. In the last years of his life Pissarro suffered from eye problems and was forced to abandon outdoor painting. However he continued to work in his studio in Paris until his death on November 13, 1903. Pissarro lived long enough to see the start of Impressionist fame, yet during his lifetime he sold relatively few paintings. Post-Impressionists such as Cezanne and Gauguin revered him, both artists even referred to him as their “master.” Pissarro is credited with playing a primary role in the development of Impressionist technique.
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