MONTICELLI Adolphe (1824-1886)

“Arlésiennes ladies, le conciliabule”

Oil on panel,
Signed lower right,
ca 1870/1871,

Handwritten annotation on the back of the panel: On the back of the panel under the signature of Mr. Joseph Vigne, mayor of Salon : “This panel was painted by Monticelli when he lived at Maison Aufroy Bernard, boulevard Saint-Laurent number 1, in Salon (Bouches-du-Rhône), during the winter of 1870-1871”.

Provenance: 
-Offered by the artist during the winter of 1870/1871 to Mr Joseph Vigne, mayor of Salon de Provence (annotated on the back of the panel)
-Collection of Mr Doctor Mireur
-Sale of the collection of Mr Doctor Mireur: 88 paintings from painter Adolphe Monticelli in order to finance his Dictionary of art sales. Lot n ° 47 “Arlésiennes”: 200 francs - (label on the back)
-Collection Mildred Anna Williams (1873-1939)
-Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco: California Palace the Legion Of Honor (label on the back and French customs stamp.
-Private collection

Exhibition: Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco: California Palace the Legion Of Honor

The authenticity of the work has been confirmed by the expert Mr. Marc STAMMEGNA, after visual examination of the work.

This work by the painter Adolphe Monticelli, produced during the winter of 1870-1871 at Salon de Provence, depicts a rare subject for the artist, namely the Arlésiennes. Indeed, only few paintings by the artist tackle this theme. The artist offers us here a meeting of six women from Arles at Salon in their pretty picturesque costumes. The artist's mastery of his technique mixes impasto and lightness, without forgetting his total mastery of light to give poetry to his work.

From a family of Italian origin, Adolphe Monticelli was a pupil of the painter Augustin Aubert at the free drawing school in Marseille. In September 1846 he won the first prize for the living model. Subsequently, he worked in Béziers, Toulouse and Nîmes. The painter also stays in Paris on different occasions. The first time, in 1847, he enrolled in the studio of the painter Paul Delaroche and studied at the Louvre. The second time, in 1856, he met Delacroix, Daubigny, Corot, Troyon who held him in high esteem. It is at this moment that Adolphe Monticelli will meet the painter Narcisse Diaz de la Pena and discover Barbizon.

His successes under the Second Empire was confirmed. Due to the siege of Paris, the Franco-German War and the fall of the Second Empire, in September 1870, he returned on foot to his hometown of Marseille. During his various stops to return to Provence, the artist is welcomed "for the price of hospitality, of which portraits, in charcoal or in graphite". Our work was produced and offered by the artist in gratitude for the hospitality he received at Maison Aufroy Bernard in Salon, during the winter of 1870/1870.

Upon his arrival in Marseille, the artist will then find himself misunderstood by his compatriots. He ended his life in poverty before dying with hemiplegia.

This magnificent painter, this seigneurial visionary died in a miserable room furnished with a bed, an easel and two chairs; but a red curtain, floating in front of the window, represented for him all the illusion and the magic of light.

Size: 22 x 47.5 cm without frame and 35 x 65.5 cm with its original gilded wood frame.

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