André-léon Vivrel (1886-1976): Landscape At The Bridge

André-Léon VIVREL (1886-1976) Landscape with a bridge Oil on paper mounted on panel Dimensions: 25.5 x 32.5 cm Signed lower right. Painting in very good condition. Recently cleaned and varnished Beautiful new gilded frame, offered Dimensions with frame: 33 x 40 cm Sold with invoice and certificate of authenticity. Fast and careful shipping with insurance. André-Léon Vivrel was born in 1886 in Paris. At only 15 years old, he decided to become a painter. He was supported in this path by his mother, whom he describes as his first teacher, and his father, a wine merchant and First Prize for drawing in 1870. A student at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand, André-Léon Vivrel entered the Académie Julian in 1910. There, he followed the teachings of Paul Albert Laurens and then attended the studio of Marcel Baschet and Henri Royer at the École des Beaux-Arts. He rented a studio in Montmartre, at 65 rue Caulaincourt, just eight rooms away from Auguste Renoir's. His first participation in the Salon des artistes français was in 1913. Mobilized in 1914, he received the Croix de guerre for heroic conduct in 1917. After the war, he returned to his Montmartre studio. He was awarded an honorable mention at the 1920 Salon and the State bought the two still lifes he exhibited at the Salon des indépendants. He also presented two portraits of Breton women painted on his return from a stay in Ploumanac'h (Côtesss d'Armor). In 1922, Vivrel appeared for the first time at the Salon de la Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts. After receiving the Deldebat de Gonzalva prize in 1932, he won a silver medal at the Salon des artistes français the following year with "Le Temps des cerises". In 1934, Vivrel presented Bathers, the first painting in a series of large nudes sent to the Salon until 1943. The culmination of his research into the female nude, his "Bathers" from 1939 were awarded a gold medal at the Salon des artistes français. This final award crowned a silver medal obtained by Vivrel in 1937, at the International Exhibition of Arts and Techniques in Paris. Critics unanimously praised his talent and, in 1940, Louis Paillard did not hesitate to write on the front page of the "Petit Journal" of May 6, 1940: "André Vivrel, appears, I proclaim, as one of the best in this Salon [of French artists]". The exhibition "Vivrel - Recent Paintings", organized by the Galerie de Berri in May 1942, illustrates, in 31 paintings, the diversity of genres tackled by Vivrel, but it is that of the landscape that he explores with the most passion. His chosen land is the Loiret, where his older brother Marcel has a second home in Châtillon-sur-Loire, not far from Champtoceaux. In the aftermath of the Great War, penniless, he takes refuge there to paint on location at a lower cost. In the spring of 1926, Vivrel is again in Brittany, from where he brings back the "Port de Camaret" exhibited at the Salon des Tuileries in 1926. A few years later, in 1934, he returns to Côtes d'Armor, where he composes seascapes which are as many studies of the sky. Vivrel spends the summer of 1926 in Corsica. There he produced watercolours which were presented, starting in the autumn, at the Galerie Georges Petit and then in New York. Each time, a unanimous review praised their qualities: "The exhibition of André Vivrel is that of a sensitive, fine artist, while remaining broad in his conceptions. His views of Corsica, Brittany and Paris are like his delicately harmonious flowers" ("La Semaine à Paris", 12 November 1926, p. 63). In 1928, he went to the South again. Restoring the warm and vibrant light of Provence, he painted "The Port of Saint-Tropez" exhibited the same year at the Salon des Indépendants. The theme of the Mediterranean also prevailed at the Salon des Tuileries, where Vivrel presented views of ports and ocean liners, evidence of a flourishing tourist industry. When Vivrel was not on the roads of France, he took Paris as a model. He painted the alleys of the Butte Montmartre and the monuments of the capital, such as Notre-Dame Cathedral, which he produced in series like Monet. He liked to linger on the banks of the Seine, which offered him many unusual views of the city and inspired his paintings that are reminiscent of the Parisian landscapes of Albert Lebourg. Painting until his last breath, André-Léon Vivrel died in Bonneville-sur-Touques on June 7, 1976.