David Sutter, Barbizon (rousseau, Harpignies) – Two Landscapes From The Surroundings Of Nemours

David Sutter (1811 – 1880)
1. Landscape with rocks overlooking a valley (Nemours church?), 1876
9.5 x 17 cm
Graphite pencil and grey wash
Signed and dated, lower right, in pen: “D.Sutter 76”

2. Landscape on the outskirts of Nemours, 1875
9.5 x 16 cm
Graphite pencil
Signed, dated and located, top center, in pencil: “D. Sutter 1875 Nemours”
oval marie-louise, gold border

Framed, under glass
Dimensions with frame: 19.5 x 26.5 cm

Drawings sold together for 300€.
Possibility of purchasing a drawing individually : please enquire.

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Having crossed the 19th century with elegance, the Swiss artist David Sutter (1811-1880), naturalized French in 1872, was a man of many talents, with an insatiable curiosity and possessing the analytical mind of the finest thinkers of aesthetics of his time. A friend of some of the most sincere painters of Barbizon, notably Jean-François Millet and Théodore Rousseau, he was appointed professor of aesthetics at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, between 1865 and 1870, where his lessons were very successful.

Here we present two landscapes which place in the foreground of the composition the rocks of the forest of Fontainebleau, which here symbolize the place claimed by the painter, that is to say on the motif, as close as possible to nature and keeping a certain distance from the city.

If the landscape of 1876 is clearly located by the artist in Nemours, it also seems that the bell tower visible in the background of the drawing of 1875 is that of the church of the same town. In this drawing, precisely, the foreground is covered with a grey wash which reinforces the overall impression and constructs the landscape in a very subtle way. For this use of the wash as well as the choice of the miniature format, this landscape evokes the art of Henri Harpignies, another friend of David Sutter.

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Another drawing by David Sutter can be found on our Proantic gallery, which allows you to discover his work in pen and brown ink: Autumn landscape with radiant sun, 1862