AUTOGRAPH SIGNED LETTER BY AMAURY-DUVAL (French painter) circa 1880

  

[AUTOGRAPH LETTER - FRENCH XIXth CENTURY PAINTER]. Upon returning home, I learn that you were kind enough to come by; there must have been some misunderstanding on my sister's part, as I was supposed to have the honor of visiting you instead, if a matter with a notary had not kept me longer than I thought... Amaury-Duval, pseudonym of Eugène-Emmanuel-Amaury Pineu-Duval. Born in Montrouge on April 16, 1808, died in Paris on December 25, 1885, was a French painter. He was the son of the diplomat and historian Amaury Duval and the nephew of the playwright Alexandre Duval.

Amaury-Duval was one of the first students to be admitted to Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres' workshop. In 1829, he was part of the commission of artists and scholars designated by Charles X to go to Greece during the Morea Expedition, as a draftsman in the archaeology section. He made his debut at the Salon of 1833 with several portraits including "The Green Lady" and his "Self-Portrait," now preserved at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Rennes. In 1834, he exhibited his "Greek Shepherd Discovering an Ancient Bas-Relief.

" From 1834 to 1836, he undertook a long journey to Italy, to Florence, Rome, and Naples. Where he happily discovered the art of the Italian Renaissance. Back in France, he participated in the state-led church decorations projects under Louis-Philippe and then Napoleon III: the Saint Philomena chapel at the Saint-Merry church (1840-44), the Virgin chapel at Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois, in Paris (1844-46), and the parish church of Saint-Germain-en-Laye (1849-56).

His love for Italian primitives and the consequences he drew from it in his painting made him classified as a French pre-Raphaelite. In 1878, he published "Ingres' Studio - Memories.

" Baudelaire criticized Ingres' school and Amaury-Duval's painting. Flandrin, Amaury-Duval, and Lehmann have this excellent quality, that their modeling. The piece is well conceived, executed easily and all in one breath; but their portraits are often tainted with a pretentious and clumsy affectation. Their immoderate taste for distinction often plays them bad tricks.

We know with what admirable simplicity they seek distinguished tones, that is to say tones that, if intense, would scream like the devil and holy water, like marble and vinegar; but as they are excessively pale and taken in a homeopathic dose, the effect is more surprising than painful: that is the great triumph!" Baudelaire praised Delacroix and disparaged Ingres and his school.

Later in the XIXth century, Degas admired Ingres. And one can look at his school more impartially. Maurice Denis described Amaury Duval. As "original, delightful, and tender spirit.

" 1 sheet of blue laid paper, folded in its center forming 4pp. (folded: approximately 20.5x13.5cm). [Provenance Georges or Louis Boulay].