Georges Borgeaud (1913-1998), The Cherry, Oil On Canvas, 1979

Georges BORGEAUD (1913-1998)
Swiss School
La Cerise
Certoux (Geneva), 1979
Oil on canvas
Signed lower left
Titled, signed, dated and located on the back
In its original frame
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22 x 24 cm [frame]
39 x 41 cm [frame]
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Supported by public assistance, Georges Borgeaud was raised on a farm in Morrens. At the age of sixteen, he completed an apprenticeship as a horticulturist. He has lived in Geneva since 1936. Self-taught above all, he nevertheless took a few evening classes at the School of Arts and Crafts in this city. Painting took up all his free time, but he had to do many small jobs to make a living. In 1938, he married Aurélie Overney; The couple had a daughter, Daisy, in 1941. After working as a storekeeper, he became a ground employee at Swissair from 1960 to 1968. In this position, where he worked at night, he benefited from reduced-price travel, which allowed him to undertake numerous trips around the world. Tahiti was one example in 1963. In addition to the south and west of France, Italy, Greece, Spain, Portugal, China, the United States, Bali, Easter Island, Sri Lanka, and Kenya were the destinations of repeated trips. From 1968 onwards, he was able to give up all bread-and-butter work. His first exhibition was in 1947, but success came late with a major retrospective devoted to him by the Musée Rath in 1963, then the Manoir de Martigny in 1968, and finally the Abbatiale de Bellelay in 1973, exhibitions that were well received by the public. It was then that he acquired a house in Perly-Certhoux, very close to the French border, which he transformed and lived there until his death. In 1974, he met Marie Rose Moreillon, who would be his last companion. He exhibited regularly in galleries in French-speaking Switzerland, German-speaking Switzerland, and also in France. Other retrospectives, notably at the Abbatiale et Musée de Payerne in 1988 and 1997, and at the Fondation Pierre Gianadda in 1993, were very successful in terms of attendance and sales. In 1993, he received the Prix du conseil du Léman, awarded by the Commission pour la protection des eaux du Léman. In the absence of a critical monograph or a catalogue raisonné, it is difficult to get a clear idea of the evolution of Georges Borgeaud's work. The success he enjoyed at the end of the 1960s clearly corresponds to a change of direction that dates back to around 1963. A 1989 memoir lists more than 1,000 paintings up to 1988 and he painted a lot after that. He is above all a landscape painter inspired by the places he visited during his many travels. Slides and pen sketches taken on site precede the paintings made in the studio. Regarding his paintings, the influence of Maurice Utrillo (1883 – 1955) for religious architecture and especially of Yves Brayer (1907 – 1990) for the representation of nature has sometimes been mentioned. From the end of the 1980s, still lifes with fruit or flowers became a subject of choice. He arranged various elements on a horizontal or vertical surface and combined them by playing with complementary colours while making the white backgrounds vibrate. The popular Valaisan writer Maurice Zermatten (1910 – 2001) devoted a biography to him based on a recording in which the artist recounts his life and prefaces several exhibitions, but with the exception of press reports (which he carefully collected) Georges Borgeaud has never been the subject of an in-depth critical study. He organized his exhibitions and the publications that accompanied them himself with uncommon energy; marginal in relation to institutions, he turned directly to the public without critical mediation.
Works: Geneva, Museum of Art and History; Abbatiale et Musée de Payerne.
Patrick Schaefer, « Georges Borgeaud », in SIKART Dictionnaire sur l'art en Suisse, 2005.