Georges Petit
Encyclopedia
Georges Petit was a French
art dealer
, a key figure in the Paris
art world and an important promoter and cultivator of Impressionist artists.
According to Robert Jensen in his book Marketing Modernism in Fin-de-Siecle Europe, the auction house assumed, "multiple roles that ran the gamut from certifying the authenticity of the object, to guiding it through the hazards of the marketplace, to establishing its provenance and enlisting critics and historians to situate the artist's importance."
Georges Petit inherited the firm, as well as a château and 3 million francs in 1877. He constructed a town house on the rue de Seze. His annual expenses amounted to some 400,000 francs. That's what he spent to support his wife, children, mistress... and shooting expenses.
Jensen quotes Emile Zola
as saying that the younger Petit was "more ambitious than his father… competitive to the point of wanting to ruin his rivals". Jensen continues, "[Petit] would wait… for the Americans to arrive in Paris every May. And what he bought for 10,000 francs, he sold for 40,000."
patron, Ernest Hoschedé. Petit was just 22 years old at this time — and it was only a year after he inherited the business — so his involvement with the Impressionists began with the commencement of his career. However, according to a biography at the National Art Gallery (USA), this was at the end of the Impressionists' "lean years," and their works had already begun to find a market.
(1831-1922). Durand-Ruel took over his business from his father in 1865. The Petit and Durand-Ruel galleries had been the top two firms in Paris dating back to the 1850s. Paul Durand-Ruel was 25 years older than Petit and had become an advocate of the Impressionists as early as 1870.
The gallery which Petit opened at 12, rue Godot de Mauroy in 1881 was a popular alternative exhibition space to the official Salon. Petit's gallery later relocated to 8, rue de Sèze in the heart of Paris.
Petit made his private views into grand social occasions. He devised the series of Expositions internationales de Peinture, the first of which was held in 1882. John Singer Sargent
sent his portrait of Vernon Lee
to the inaugural event, a work which received decidedly mixed reviews. Sargent wrote, "it has been exhibited … and has consternated many people."
These events attracted the likes of Monet, Camille Pissarro
, Auguste Renoir and Alfred Sisley
.
Sisley held large retrospective exhibitions at the Galerie Georges Petit in the 1880s and 1890s. This was something of a coup for Petit, as Sisley had been previously associated with Durand-Ruel. In 1897, Petit exhibited 146 Sisley paintings and 5 of his pastels, covering the whole of his career. Two years later, just months after Sisley's death, the paintings remaining in Sisley's atelier were sold at auction by the Galerie Georges Petit to the benefit of his children.
]. He enjoyed the reputation of being a 'formidable salesman', and most important Paris auctions... were held on his premises because the Hôtel Drouot
accommodations were insufficient. This fact only increased his rivalry with Durand-Ruel, as Petit did not care to have his competitor officiate as 'expert' at public sales held in his gallery".
Michael C. FitzGerald
, writing in his book The Making of Modernism, says that, "by the 1890s [Petit had] wrested many of the Impressionists from their first dealer, Durand-Ruel, and presented such important exhibitions as Monet's Morning on the Seine and Norman coast series. According to Emile Zola
, who knew the Parisian art world inside and out, Petit was the 'apotheosis
' of dealers when the Impressionist market soared and competition among marchands... became intense."
Petit held a number of auction sales on his premises, including the Narishkine collection in 1883, the Chocquet and Doria collections in 1889 and Edgar Degas
' studio sale in 1918–19.
The biographer at the Whistler Centre writes that Petit's Société internationale de Peinture was run on similar principles to the Grosvenor Gallery
. Like the Grosvenor, it had an advisory body of artists (including Alfred Stevens
, Raimundo de Madrazo y Garreta
and Giuseppe de Nittis
), but in fact was run by Petit alone. Other artists such as Paul Baudry, Jean Léon Gérôme, Jozef Israëls
, Lawrence Alma-Tadema
, John Everett Millais
, Ludwig Knaus
and Adolph Friedrich Erdmann von Menzel were also involved.
According to the Whistler Centre, beginning in 1881, "the gallery was associated with print publishing and specialised in monochrome, very high quality reproductive engravings of paintings by contemporary artists such as Félix Bracquemond
and Marcellin Desboutin".
In 1887, Auguste Rodin
exhibited The Kiss and three figures from The Burghers of Calais
at the Galerie. In 1889, Rodin and Monet held a joint exposition there, with Rodin showing 36 works. According to the August Rodin Project, the "Georges Petit exhibition sealed Rodin’s position as France’s premier sculptor and opened doors to collections and museums around the world."
In the late 1880s, Petit turned down Louis-Ambroise Vollard
(1866–1939) for an apprenticeship because he knew no foreign languages. Vollard would, himself, become a legendary art dealer... as well as an avid collector and noted publisher. Vollard played an important role in the careers of Paul Cézanne
, Maillol, Picasso, Rouault, Gauguin and Vincent Van Gogh
.
at this time, became director in 1929.
Henri Matisse
held at large retrospective at the Galerie in 1931, the largest exhibition of his works in France to that date.
In 1932, the Galerie hosted an important retrospective of the works of Pablo Picasso
. Art historian Michael C. FitzGerald
writes that, "displaying 225 paintings, seven sculptures, and six illustrated books, the exhibition was a blockbuster. Apart from sheer size, the show ranged across Picasso's career from 1900 to the early months of 1932."
FitzGerald
opines, "the Galerie George Petit was a paradigm of the new relationships among dealers and collectors that formed in the early thirties." He continues, "although bearing an illustrious name in the history of modern art, the gallery was far from its origins when the Picasso restrospective hung."
The Galerie Georges Petit closed in 1933 and its assets were sold at auction.
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
art dealer
Art dealer
An art dealer is a person or company that buys and sells works of art. Art dealers' professional associations serve to set high standards for accreditation or membership and to support art exhibitions and shows.-Role:...
, a key figure in the Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
art world and an important promoter and cultivator of Impressionist artists.
Early career
Petit was the son of François Petit, who founded the firm of art dealers at 7, rue St Georges in 1846. Within just a few years, the Galerie François Petit was among the most powerful firms in the French art market.According to Robert Jensen in his book Marketing Modernism in Fin-de-Siecle Europe, the auction house assumed, "multiple roles that ran the gamut from certifying the authenticity of the object, to guiding it through the hazards of the marketplace, to establishing its provenance and enlisting critics and historians to situate the artist's importance."
Georges Petit inherited the firm, as well as a château and 3 million francs in 1877. He constructed a town house on the rue de Seze. His annual expenses amounted to some 400,000 francs. That's what he spent to support his wife, children, mistress... and shooting expenses.
Jensen quotes Emile Zola
Émile Zola
Émile François Zola was a French writer, the most important exemplar of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism...
as saying that the younger Petit was "more ambitious than his father… competitive to the point of wanting to ruin his rivals". Jensen continues, "[Petit] would wait… for the Americans to arrive in Paris every May. And what he bought for 10,000 francs, he sold for 40,000."
Impressionism
Petit began buying Impressionist works as early as 1878, when he served as an expert in the sales of works by Jean Victor Louis Faure and of paintings from the collection of bankrupt former Claude MonetClaude Monet
Claude Monet was a founder of French impressionist painting, and the most consistent and prolific practitioner of the movement's philosophy of expressing one's perceptions before nature, especially as applied to plein-air landscape painting. . Retrieved 6 January 2007...
patron, Ernest Hoschedé. Petit was just 22 years old at this time — and it was only a year after he inherited the business — so his involvement with the Impressionists began with the commencement of his career. However, according to a biography at the National Art Gallery (USA), this was at the end of the Impressionists' "lean years," and their works had already begun to find a market.
Rivalries and rise to prominence
Petit had an intense rivalry with art dealer Paul-Marie-Joseph Durand-RuelPaul Durand-Ruel
Paul Durand-Ruel was a French art dealer who is associated with the Impressionists. He was one of the first modern art dealers who provided support to his painters with stipends and solo exhibitions....
(1831-1922). Durand-Ruel took over his business from his father in 1865. The Petit and Durand-Ruel galleries had been the top two firms in Paris dating back to the 1850s. Paul Durand-Ruel was 25 years older than Petit and had become an advocate of the Impressionists as early as 1870.
The gallery which Petit opened at 12, rue Godot de Mauroy in 1881 was a popular alternative exhibition space to the official Salon. Petit's gallery later relocated to 8, rue de Sèze in the heart of Paris.
Petit made his private views into grand social occasions. He devised the series of Expositions internationales de Peinture, the first of which was held in 1882. John Singer Sargent
John Singer Sargent
John Singer Sargent was an American artist, considered the "leading portrait painter of his generation" for his evocations of Edwardian era luxury. During his career, he created roughly 900 oil paintings and more than 2,000 watercolors, as well as countless sketches and charcoal drawings...
sent his portrait of Vernon Lee
Vernon Lee
Vernon Lee was the pseudonym of the British writer Violet Paget . She is remembered today primarily for her supernatural fiction and her work on aesthetics. An early follower of Walter Pater, she also wrote over a dozen volumes of essays on art, music, and travel.-Biography:She was born at Château...
to the inaugural event, a work which received decidedly mixed reviews. Sargent wrote, "it has been exhibited … and has consternated many people."
These events attracted the likes of Monet, Camille Pissarro
Camille Pissarro
Camille Pissarro was a French Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist painter born on the island of St Thomas . His importance resides in his contributions to both Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, as he was the only artist to exhibit in both forms...
, Auguste Renoir and Alfred Sisley
Alfred Sisley
Alfred Sisley was an Impressionist landscape painter who was born and spent most of his life, in France, but retained British citizenship. He was the most consistent of the Impressionists in his dedication to painting landscape en plein air...
.
Sisley held large retrospective exhibitions at the Galerie Georges Petit in the 1880s and 1890s. This was something of a coup for Petit, as Sisley had been previously associated with Durand-Ruel. In 1897, Petit exhibited 146 Sisley paintings and 5 of his pastels, covering the whole of his career. Two years later, just months after Sisley's death, the paintings remaining in Sisley's atelier were sold at auction by the Galerie Georges Petit to the benefit of his children.
"Formidable salesman"
The biography posted by the National Gallery of Art notes that, "Petit also dealt in Salon painters and handled the works of many successful and fashionable artists of the period, rivaling another Parisian dealer, Boussod & Valadon [successors to Goupil & CieGoupil & Cie
Goupil & Cie was a leading art dealership in 19th century France, with headquarters in Paris. Step by step, Goupil established a worldwide trade with reproductions of paintings and sculptures, with a network of branches in London, Brussels, The Hague, Berlin and Vienna, as well as in New York and...
]. He enjoyed the reputation of being a 'formidable salesman', and most important Paris auctions... were held on his premises because the Hôtel Drouot
Hôtel Drouot
Hôtel Drouot is a large auction house in Paris, known for fine art, antiques, and antiquities. It consists of 16 halls hosting 70 independent auction firms, which operate under the umbrella grouping of Drouot....
accommodations were insufficient. This fact only increased his rivalry with Durand-Ruel, as Petit did not care to have his competitor officiate as 'expert' at public sales held in his gallery".
Michael C. FitzGerald
Michael C. FitzGerald
Michael C. FitzGerald—born 1953—is professor of fine arts and director of the program in art history at Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut. After his A.B. in 1976 from Stanford University, FitzGerald obtained both his MBA and Ph.D. degrees from Columbia University in 1986 and 1987 respectively...
, writing in his book The Making of Modernism, says that, "by the 1890s [Petit had] wrested many of the Impressionists from their first dealer, Durand-Ruel, and presented such important exhibitions as Monet's Morning on the Seine and Norman coast series. According to Emile Zola
Émile Zola
Émile François Zola was a French writer, the most important exemplar of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism...
, who knew the Parisian art world inside and out, Petit was the 'apotheosis
Apotheosis
Apotheosis is the glorification of a subject to divine level. The term has meanings in theology, where it refers to a belief, and in art, where it refers to a genre.In theology, the term apotheosis refers to the idea that an individual has been raised to godlike stature...
' of dealers when the Impressionist market soared and competition among marchands... became intense."
Petit held a number of auction sales on his premises, including the Narishkine collection in 1883, the Chocquet and Doria collections in 1889 and Edgar Degas
Edgar Degas
Edgar Degas[p] , born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, was a French artist famous for his work in painting, sculpture, printmaking and drawing. He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism although he rejected the term, and preferred to be called a realist...
' studio sale in 1918–19.
The biographer at the Whistler Centre writes that Petit's Société internationale de Peinture was run on similar principles to the Grosvenor Gallery
Grosvenor Gallery
The Grosvenor Gallery was an art gallery in London founded in 1877 by Sir Coutts Lindsay and his wife Blanche. Its first directors were J. Comyns Carr and Charles Hallé...
. Like the Grosvenor, it had an advisory body of artists (including Alfred Stevens
Alfred Stevens (painter)
Alfred Émile Léopold Stevens was a Belgian painter.Alfred Stevens was born in Brussels. He came from a family involved with the visual arts: his older brother Joseph and his son Léopold were painters, while another brother Arthur was an art dealer and critic...
, Raimundo de Madrazo y Garreta
Raimundo de Madrazo y Garreta
Raimundo de Madrazo y Garreta was a Spanish realist painter.He studied painting under his father, Federico de Madrazo, and at the School of the Beaux Arts in Madrid. He was born in Rome, but after 1860 he lived mostly in Paris, where he studied under Léon Cogniet...
and Giuseppe de Nittis
Giuseppe De Nittis
Giuseppe De Nittis was an Italian painter whose work merges the styles of Salon art and Impressionism.De Nittis was born in Barletta, where he first studied under Giovanni Battista Calò...
), but in fact was run by Petit alone. Other artists such as Paul Baudry, Jean Léon Gérôme, Jozef Israëls
Jozef Israëls
Jozef Israëls was a Dutch painter, and "the most respected Dutch artist of the second half of the nineteenth century".-Youth:...
, Lawrence Alma-Tadema
Lawrence Alma-Tadema
Lawrence Alma-Tadema, OM, RA was a Dutch painter.Born in Dronrijp, the Netherlands, and trained at the Royal Academy of Antwerp, Belgium, he settled in England in 1870 and spent the rest of his life there...
, John Everett Millais
John Everett Millais
Sir John Everett Millais, 1st Baronet, PRA was an English painter and illustrator and one of the founders of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.-Early life:...
, Ludwig Knaus
Ludwig Knaus
Ludwig Knaus was a German genre painter of the younger Düsseldorf school. He was born at Wiesbaden and studied from 1845 to 1852 under Sohn and Schadow in Düsseldorf. His early works, like "The Gamblers," in the Düsseldorf Gallery, are in the manner of that school, being dark and heavy in color...
and Adolph Friedrich Erdmann von Menzel were also involved.
According to the Whistler Centre, beginning in 1881, "the gallery was associated with print publishing and specialised in monochrome, very high quality reproductive engravings of paintings by contemporary artists such as Félix Bracquemond
Felix Bracquemond
Félix Henri Bracquemond was a French painter and etcher.Félix Bracquemond was born in Paris. He was trained in early youth as a trade lithographer, until Guichard, a pupil of Ingres, took him to his studio. His portrait of his grandmother, painted by him at the age of nineteen, attracted Théophile...
and Marcellin Desboutin".
In 1887, Auguste Rodin
Auguste Rodin
François-Auguste-René Rodin , known as Auguste Rodin , was a French sculptor. Although Rodin is generally considered the progenitor of modern sculpture, he did not set out to rebel against the past...
exhibited The Kiss and three figures from The Burghers of Calais
The Burghers of Calais
Les Bourgeois de Calais is one of the most famous sculptures by Auguste Rodin, completed in 1889. It serves as a monument to an occurrence in 1347 during the Hundred Years' War, when Calais, an important French port on the English Channel, was under siege by the English for over a year.-History:The...
at the Galerie. In 1889, Rodin and Monet held a joint exposition there, with Rodin showing 36 works. According to the August Rodin Project, the "Georges Petit exhibition sealed Rodin’s position as France’s premier sculptor and opened doors to collections and museums around the world."
In the late 1880s, Petit turned down Louis-Ambroise Vollard
Ambroise Vollard
Ambroise Vollard is regarded as one of the most important dealers in French contemporary art at the beginning of the twentieth century...
(1866–1939) for an apprenticeship because he knew no foreign languages. Vollard would, himself, become a legendary art dealer... as well as an avid collector and noted publisher. Vollard played an important role in the careers of Paul Cézanne
Paul Cézanne
Paul Cézanne was a French artist and Post-Impressionist painter whose work laid the foundations of the transition from the 19th century conception of artistic endeavour to a new and radically different world of art in the 20th century. Cézanne can be said to form the bridge between late 19th...
, Maillol, Picasso, Rouault, Gauguin and Vincent Van Gogh
Vincent van Gogh
Vincent Willem van Gogh , and used Brabant dialect in his writing; it is therefore likely that he himself pronounced his name with a Brabant accent: , with a voiced V and palatalized G and gh. In France, where much of his work was produced, it is...
.
The Galerie after Petit
After Petit's death, the Galerie Georges Petit was acquired by prominent art dealers/brothers Gaston and Josse Bernheim-Jeune and their partner Etienne Bignou. George Keller, who was establishing a relationship with Salvador DalíSalvador Dalí
Salvador Domènec Felip Jacint Dalí i Domènech, Marquis de Púbol , commonly known as Salvador Dalí , was a prominent Spanish Catalan surrealist painter born in Figueres,Spain....
at this time, became director in 1929.
Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse was a French artist, known for his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known primarily as a painter...
held at large retrospective at the Galerie in 1931, the largest exhibition of his works in France to that date.
In 1932, the Galerie hosted an important retrospective of the works of Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...
. Art historian Michael C. FitzGerald
Michael C. FitzGerald
Michael C. FitzGerald—born 1953—is professor of fine arts and director of the program in art history at Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut. After his A.B. in 1976 from Stanford University, FitzGerald obtained both his MBA and Ph.D. degrees from Columbia University in 1986 and 1987 respectively...
writes that, "displaying 225 paintings, seven sculptures, and six illustrated books, the exhibition was a blockbuster. Apart from sheer size, the show ranged across Picasso's career from 1900 to the early months of 1932."
FitzGerald
Michael C. FitzGerald
Michael C. FitzGerald—born 1953—is professor of fine arts and director of the program in art history at Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut. After his A.B. in 1976 from Stanford University, FitzGerald obtained both his MBA and Ph.D. degrees from Columbia University in 1986 and 1987 respectively...
opines, "the Galerie George Petit was a paradigm of the new relationships among dealers and collectors that formed in the early thirties." He continues, "although bearing an illustrious name in the history of modern art, the gallery was far from its origins when the Picasso restrospective hung."
The Galerie Georges Petit closed in 1933 and its assets were sold at auction.
Sources
- Jensen, Robert, Marketing Modernism in Fin-de-Siecle Europe, 1994;
- Biography at the Centre for Whistler Studies
- National Gallery of Art USA;
- O'Hare, Mary-Kate, John Singer Sargent and Modern Womanhood, The Magazine Antiques, 1 March 2006;
- Stair Sainty Gallery;
- giverny.org;
- Claude Monet virtual museum;
- FitzGerald, Michael C.Michael C. FitzGeraldMichael C. FitzGerald—born 1953—is professor of fine arts and director of the program in art history at Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut. After his A.B. in 1976 from Stanford University, FitzGerald obtained both his MBA and Ph.D. degrees from Columbia University in 1986 and 1987 respectively...
, The Making of Modernism: Picasso and the Creation of the Market for Twentieth-Century Art, 1995; - Metropolitan Museum of Art, Chronology of the Artist's Life (Rodin);
- Matisse, Henri and Jack D. Flam, Matisse on Art, 1973;
- Exhibition Notes: Cézanne to Picasso: Ambroise Vollard, Patron of the Avant-Garde, The Art Institute of Chicago
- Dali, Salvadore, The Secret Life of Salvador Dalí, 1993.
External links
- artnet.com artnet.com chronology on Alfred Sisley
- Website of Hôtel Drouot in English and French
- White House image of Morning on the Seine
- August Rodin Project, August Rodin: His Life and Art
- The Art Institute of Chicago: Cézanne to Picasso: Ambroise Vollard, Patron of the Avant-Garde
- Website of the Galerie Bernheim-Jeune
- Salvador Dali Surreal