Henri Michel-Lévy
| Henri Michel-Lévy | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born |
Henri Lévy July 11, 1844 Passy, France |
| Died |
September 17, 1914 (aged 70) Paris, France |
| Resting place | Montmarte Cemetery |
| Nationality | French |
| Known for | portraits, landscape paintings, genre paintings, pastels |
| Notable work | "Le Peintre Eugène Boudin peignant des animaux dans la prairie de Deauville", oil on canvas, 22 x 27 cm (1880), "André Malraux modern art museum, Le Havre, France" |
| Movement | impressionism |
Henri Michel-Lévy (July 11, 1844 in Passy, France - September 17, 1914 in Paris), was a French impressionist painter.[1]
Biography
Lévy was the third of the four sons of Michel Lévy and Thérèse Emerique. The family lived in Paris but originated in the Lorraine province in the north-east of France. The father of Henri was a tradesman.
Lévy was a pupil of Félix Barrias (1822-1907) and of Antoine Vollon (1833-1900).[2] Henri Lévy changed his name to Henri « Michel-Lévy » by adding his father's first name to its surname. This was allegedly done to avoid confusion with other homonyms at that time.[3]
Lévy was an artist but also an art collector as can be seen from the works of Watteau, Boucher and Fragonard that were included in his posthumous sale.[4]
His grave is located in the Montmartre Cemetery.[5]
Work
Henri Michel-Lévy met regularly with French impressionists, in particular Edgar Degas, Édouard Manet and Eugène Boudin from whom he got most probably his modern taste. He was a portraitist and often painted subjects going about their usual business,[6] as often found as a common thread in Impressionist painting. Lévy is known for Painting of Eugène Boudin (1880) as the famous painter is himself sketching cows in the fields near Honfleur.[7] His subjects are not professionals but rather found in his social circle, like the wife of his friend, Edgar Degas or his own family.
From 1868 to 1886, Henri Michel-Lévy exhibited at the Salon in Paris, where he was awarded "honorable" mention in 1880 and a third-class medal in 1881. He won a bronze medal at the Exposition Universelle of 1889.[2] He participated in the Salon between 1868 and 1914.[8]
In 1878, he was represented by Edgar Degas in his atelier (see insert picture)[2] on a painting presented at the fourth Impressionist exhibition in 1879. The painting to the right of Michel-Lévy was identified by Theodore Reff as The Regattas, a painting from Michel-Lévy that was photographically documented but whose whereabouts remain unknown.[9] Michel-Lévy and Degas exchanged portraits of each other on that occasion. But soon after Michel-Lévy sells Degas' painting, which irritates Degas who disdainfully comments: "You have done a despicable thing; you knew very well that I couldn't sell your portrait".[10]
In 1885, he painted the portrait of Auguste Guerbois,[11] the owner of Café Guerbois (nearby Place de Clichy) not too far from Montmartre where painters used to meet. Art historian Ronald Pickvance suggested that Michel-Lévy may have been the painter of the portrait, Madame Lévy, which is usually believed to have been painted by Edouard Manet.[12]
As a landscape painter, Henri Michel-Lévy focused on the peasant life away from the romantic views of the time. But a large portion of his exterior paintings dealt with the middle-class life of the 19th century. An example of that is a painting at the beach (Le Pouligen, la plage) that can be found at Museum Baron Martin, Gray, France in a style that is reminiscent of Boudin's work. Similarly, the painting found as background in Degas's portray of Michel-Lévy revisiting the theme of Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe.
Selected paintings
The following paintings are exposed in museums across France:
- Le Peintre Eugène Boudin peignant des animaux dans la prairie de Deauville (1880) oil on canvas, 22 x 27 cm, Museum of modern art André Malraux - MuMa, Le Havre, France
- Auguste Guerbois (1885) oil on canvas, 46 x 38 cm, Musée d'Orsay, Paris, France
- La Nourrice oil on canvas , Museum of Fine Arts, Orléans, France
- Ville balnéaire normande (about 1900) oil on canvas, 54.5 x 65 cm, Montebello Villa, Trouville, France
- Le Pouligen, la plage oil on canvas, Baron Martin Museum, Gray, France[13]
- Bateaux sur la grève, Louvre Museum.[14]
References
- ↑ "Benezit Dictionary of Artists" Oxford University Press (Pub.), Oxford (2006) ISBN 978-0-19-977378-7, e-ISBN 9780199899913
- 1 2 3 "Only the Best: Masterpieces of the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon", K. Baetjer and J. D. Draper (Eds), The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (2000) p140, ISBN 978-0-81-096546-1
- ↑ (fr)Catalogue Bnf
- ↑ "Catalogue des tableaux anciens...composant la collection H. Michel-Lévy et dont la vente..." Galerie Georges Petit (Pub.), Paris (1919)
- ↑ (fr)Cimetière de Montmartre, 3e Division
- ↑ see for instance La Nourrice, Beaux-Arts Museum, Orléans, France
- ↑ Mima-lehavre.fr
- ↑ Oxford Index, Benezit Dictionary of Artists
- ↑ T. Reff "DEGAS: The Artist's Mind" The Metropolitain Museum of Art, Harper and Row publishers (1976) ISBN 0870991469
- ↑ R. Gimpel "Journal d'un collectionneur" Hermann Ed. (2011) ISBN 2705680160
- ↑ painting available from the Musée d'Orsay online collection "Auguste Guerbois by Henri Michel-Lévy", Orsay Museum, Paris, France
- ↑ L. R. Lehmbeck "Edouard Manet's portraits of women" ProQuest p253-254 (2007)
- ↑ Musee-baronmartin, jpg
- ↑ culture.gouv.fr, Mistral/Joconde
Content in this edit is translated from the existing French Wikipedia article at fr:Henri Michel-Lévy; see its history for attribution.