Louis Arraou (xix-xx) Marine, Circa 1920/1925

Novelist with for example in the 1930s the publication of a sci-fi novel "A Martian on Earth", Louis Arraou is also illustrated in painting as evidenced by our rare painting painted with a knife. Self-taught and complete artist. Louis Arraou (XIX-XX) Navy, circa 1925 Oil on canvas 46 x 55 cm (59 x 67 cm framed) In its original frame and signed lower left Here is what we read in Le Gaulois in 1925 about an exhibition of the artist at the gallery John Levy A PAINTER OF TODAY LOUIS ARRAOU For the amateurs of today, saturated with paintings which ask with an artificial excess the charm of the unforeseen, and which solicit so the attention with an ostentation without sincerity, it is a true joy which is very little given, to finally find a simple talent and full of freshness. The paintings that Louis Arraou is currently exhibiting at the Galerie John Levy, near Place Vendome, are among those. At first, they appeal to an accent of truth which is not feigned, and which is found in analysis, in the very choice of subjects. M. Arraou likes to represent nature in his highest and most radiant views. These are views of the Hautes-Alpes, with their rustic wooden houses, their shifting pastures of greenery, the snowy distance from their peaks or the Mediterranean horizon with the eternally blue sea vibrant with sunshine, and, in the foreground, the old Provençal boats stranded on the shore, the "tartanes refreshing and picturesque or, seeking even more to the South an exotic inspiration, Mr. Arraou likes to note the game of shadows in a small Moroccan street, the" female haik "grazing the walls tight, the breakthrough of light in the distance among the low houses. His sincerity is absolute. He had only him as his master. An accomplished amateur of good music, a talented novelist, he puts at the service of his exact vision of things a beautiful, broad craft by which the color spreads and bursts under the knife. He is an artist who creates joy.