AUGUSTIN LESAGE (1876-1954) SANS TITRE Huile sur toile Signée en bas à droite Oil on canvas; signed lower right 146,5 X 95,5 CM - 57 5/8 X 37 5/8 IN.
€40,000-60,000
PROVENANCE Vente, Tajan, Paris, 25 octobre 2010, lot 18. Acquis au cours de cette vente par le propriétaire actuel. EXPOSITION Arras, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Augustin Lesage 1876-1954, 15 octobre 1988-15 janvier 1989. BIBLIOGRAPHIE Augustin Lesage 1876-1954, catalogue d'exposition, Arras, musée des Beaux-Arts; Béthune, musée de l'hôtel de Beaulaincourt, 15 octobre 1988-15 janvier 1989; Lausanne, 2 février-30 avril 1989; Florence, 12 mai-10 juillet 1989 et Le Caire, automne 1989, P. Sers, Paris: 1989, référencé sous le n°212 et reproduit pl. 210, p. 195. "L'idée de devenir peintre était extravagante et même impensable chez un mineur de trente-cinq ans asservi depuis son adolescence. Une telle éventualité ne pouvait être évoquée que par ses guides, Léonard de Vinci puis Marius de Tyane, et pour la plus grande confusion de Lesage lui-même, qui s'est bien gardé de s'en ouvrir à quiconque, surtout pas aux siens: 'Je craignais qu'on me prenne pour un fou'. Lorsqu'il doit exécuter l'ordre d'acheter du matériel de peinture et traverser le coron avec sa toile roulée sur l'épaule, il est mort de honte. Mais Lesage a eu l'astuce inconsciente de faire passer sa vocation picturale par le biais de la médiumnité spirite et de trouver ainsi une brèche dans le barrage socio-culturel. Fallait-il que la confiscation de l'art par la bourgeoisie fût rédhibitoire pour que la prétention d'un ouvrier de communiquer avec Léonard de Vinci apparaisse moins insensée que celle de devenir peintre ! On peut néanmoins se féliciter rétrospectivement, et un peu cyniquement sans doute, de l'effet dissuasif de la culture élitaire et de l'obligation qui a été faite à Lesage d'emprunter le chemin de traverse du spiritisme. D'être ainsi éconduit de toute prétention artistique l'a détaché d'emblée des modèles du musée. Si Lesage avait délibérément consacré ses loisirs de mineur à la peinture, il n'eut été qu'un peintre du dimanche et n'eût produit qu'une singerie de l'art légitime. L'assertion de Jean Dubuffet selon laquelle l'art s'enfuit aussitôt qu'on prononce son nom se vérifie cruellement dans les milieux les plus éloignés de la culture des cultivés, milieux sur lesquels celle-ci exerce sa fascination la plus paralysante." Michel Thévoz, "Augustin Lesage et le spiritisme", in Augustin Lesage 1876-1954, catalogue d'exposition, Arras, musée des Beaux-Arts; Béthune, musée de l'hôtel de Beaulaincourt, 15 octobre 1988-15 janvier 1989; Lausanne, 2 février-30 avril 1989; Florence, 12 mai-10 juillet 1989 et LeCaire, automne 1989, P. Sers, Paris: 1989, p. 35. "The idea of becoming a painter was extravagant, even unthinkable to a thirty-five-year-old who had slaved away in the coal mines since his adolescence. Such a possibility could only be suggested by his idols, Leonardo da Vinci and Marius of Tyana [whose voices he heard encouraging him to paint], to the great confusion of Lesage himself. He took care not to reveal the truth to anyone, especially not his family: 'I was afraid that I would be taken for a madman.' He was ashamed when he followed the voices’ orders to buy art supplies and had to walk through the coron (miner’s cottage) with a rolled canvas on his shoulder. But Lesage quite unconsciously stumbled into explaining his painterly vocation through the lens of spiritism, thus finding a gap in the socio-cultural barrier of the time. The bourgeoisie had such an iron grip on art that a worker’s claim to be in communication with Leonardo da Vinci appeared less insane than that of becoming a painter! In retrospect, and perhaps a bit cynically, one might applaud the deterrent effect of cultural elitism that forced Lesage to take the backdoor of spiritism. To be discouraged from any artistic pretension also isolated him from the museum model. Had Lesage deliberately devoted his free time from mining to painting, he would have been a mere Sunday painter who produced only a handful of legitimate artworks. Jean Dubuffet's assertion that art runs away as soon as one says its name is cruelly played out in those communities most removed from the culture of the cultivated, communities upon which this culture exerts its most paralyzing fascination." Michel Thévoz, "Augustin Lesage et le spiritisme", in Augustin Lesage 1876-1954, Exhibition catalog, Arras, musée des Beaux-Arts; Béthune, musée de l'hôtel de Beaulaincourt, 15 October 1988-15 January 1989; Lausanne, 2 February-30 April 1989; Florence, 12 May-10 July 1989 et Le Caire, Autumn 1989, P.Sers, Paris: 1989, p.35.
PROVENANCE Vente, Tajan, Paris, 25 octobre 2010, lot 18. Acquis au cours de cette vente par le propriétaire actuel. EXPOSITION Arras, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Augustin Lesage 1876-1954, 15 octobre 1988-15 janvier 1989. BIBLIOGRAPHIE Augustin Lesage 1876-1954, catalogue d'exposition, Arras, musée des Beaux-Arts; Béthune, musée de l'hôtel de Beaulaincourt, 15 octobre 1988-15 janvier 1989; Lausanne, 2 février-30 avril 1989; Florence, 12 mai-10 juillet 1989 et Le Caire, automne 1989, P. Sers, Paris: 1989, référencé sous le n°212 et reproduit pl. 210, p. 195. "L'idée de devenir peintre était extravagante et même impensable chez un mineur de trente-cinq ans asservi depuis son adolescence. Une telle éventualité ne pouvait être évoquée que par ses guides, Léonard de Vinci puis Marius de Tyane, et pour la plus grande confusion de Lesage lui-même, qui s'est bien gardé de s'en ouvrir à quiconque, surtout pas aux siens: 'Je craignais qu'on me prenne pour un fou'. Lorsqu'il doit exécuter l'ordre d'acheter du matériel de peinture et traverser le coron avec sa toile roulée sur l'épaule, il est mort de honte. Mais Lesage a eu l'astuce inconsciente de faire passer sa vocation picturale par le biais de la médiumnité spirite et de trouver ainsi une brèche dans le barrage socio-culturel. Fallait-il que la confiscation de l'art par la bourgeoisie fût rédhibitoire pour que la prétention d'un ouvrier de communiquer avec Léonard de Vinci apparaisse moins insensée que celle de devenir peintre ! On peut néanmoins se féliciter rétrospectivement, et un peu cyniquement sans doute, de l'effet dissuasif de la culture élitaire et de l'obligation qui a été faite à Lesage d'emprunter le chemin de traverse du spiritisme. D'être ainsi éconduit de toute prétention artistique l'a détaché d'emblée des modèles du musée. Si Lesage avait délibérément consacré ses loisirs de mineur à la peinture, il n'eut été qu'un peintre du dimanche et n'eût produit qu'une singerie de l'art légitime. L'assertion de Jean Dubuffet selon laquelle l'art s'enfuit aussitôt qu'on prononce son nom se vérifie cruellement dans les milieux les plus éloignés de la culture des cultivés, milieux sur lesquels celle-ci exerce sa fascination la plus paralysante." Michel Thévoz, "Augustin Lesage et le spiritisme", in Augustin Lesage 1876-1954, catalogue d'exposition, Arras, musée des Beaux-Arts; Béthune, musée de l'hôtel de Beaulaincourt, 15 octobre 1988-15 janvier 1989; Lausanne, 2 février-30 avril 1989; Florence, 12 mai-10 juillet 1989 et LeCaire, automne 1989, P. Sers, Paris: 1989, p. 35. "The idea of becoming a painter was extravagant, even unthinkable to a thirty-five-year-old who had slaved away in the coal mines since his adolescence. Such a possibility could only be suggested by his idols, Leonardo da Vinci and Marius of Tyana [whose voices he heard encouraging him to paint], to the great confusion of Lesage himself. He took care not to reveal the truth to anyone, especially not his family: 'I was afraid that I would be taken for a madman.' He was ashamed when he followed the voices’ orders to buy art supplies and had to walk through the coron (miner’s cottage) with a rolled canvas on his shoulder. But Lesage quite unconsciously stumbled into explaining his painterly vocation through the lens of spiritism, thus finding a gap in the socio-cultural barrier of the time. The bourgeoisie had such an iron grip on art that a worker’s claim to be in communication with Leonardo da Vinci appeared less insane than that of becoming a painter! In retrospect, and perhaps a bit cynically, one might applaud the deterrent effect of cultural elitism that forced Lesage to take the backdoor of spiritism. To be discouraged from any artistic pretension also isolated him from the museum model. Had Lesage deliberately devoted his free time from mining to painting, he would have been a mere Sunday painter who produced only a handful of legitimate artworks. Jean Dubuffet's assertion that art runs away as soon as one says its name is cruelly played out in those communities most removed from the culture of the cultivated, communities upon which this culture exerts its most paralyzing fascination." Michel Thévoz, "Augustin Lesage et le spiritisme", in Augustin Lesage 1876-1954, Exhibition catalog, Arras, musée des Beaux-Arts; Béthune, musée de l'hôtel de Beaulaincourt, 15 October 1988-15 January 1989; Lausanne, 2 February-30 April 1989; Florence, 12 May-10 July 1989 et Le Caire, Autumn 1989, P.Sers, Paris: 1989, p.35.
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