Gustave Loiseau (1865-1935) was a French painter best known for his Post-Impressionist landscapes and urban scenes of bustling Parisian streets. Browse Gustave Loiseau paintings for sale here.
Oil on canvas, signed. Titled and dated 1926 on the stretcher.
Canvas size: 23.5 x 29in / 60 x 74cm
Frame size: 29.5 x 35in / 75 x 89cm
As well as dramatic views of towns, ports, and wild rocky coasts, Loiseau liked to paint more intimate scenes of quiet farms and hamlets. This peaceful painting was made during one of his frequent painting trips to Normandy.
Oil on canvas, signed and dated 1913
Canvas size: 20 x 24in / 51 x 61cm
Frame size: 26 x 30in / 66 x 76cm
Loiseau, like Monet before him, was interested in the effect the changing seasons had on the locations he liked to paint. He visited Auvers-sur-Oise many times, perhaps drawn by the reputation it had as a mecca for artists, including Paul Cézanne, Charles-François Daubigny, Camille Pissarro, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Norbert Goeneutte, and Vincent van Gogh, who died and was buried there.
Oil on canvas, signed. Dated 1927 verso.
Canvas size: 21.5 x 25.5in / 55 x 65cm
Frame size: 27.5 x 31.5in / 70 x 80cm
Loiseau was constantly fascinated by water, inspired by its flow and scenes of rivers at different seasons or cities and villages located along their banks. Rouen was a city he visited many times, both to paint the cathedral and the river passing through it.
Gustave Loiseau was born in Paris, the son of butcher shop owners. After unwillingly serving an apprenticeship as a decorator, an inheritance from his grandmother in 1887 presented an opportunity to fulfil his aspiration to become a painter. Following the completion of his military service, he gave up his job and dedicated his life to painting.
Loiseau’s formal training took place at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, where he studied life drawing. After a year, he left the school following an argument with a teacher. Then, he joined the landscape artist Fernand Just Quignon (whom he had met during his apprenticeship) in his studio in 1889.
Even though Loiseau was fascinated by Quignon’s airy scenes, he was disillusioned by his method of painting a canvas from sketches in his studio. For Loiseau, it was implausible that a canvas should not be painted directly from the subject, ‘en plein air’.
In 1890, seeking a location where he could concentrate on his love of landscape painting, Loiseau travelled to Pont-Aven in Brittany, a small village famous as an artist colony. He met Henry Moret, Maxime Maufra, Émile Bernard and other artists of the Pont-Aven School. Loiseau also ascertained a great deal from Gauguin, who returned to Pont-Aven in 1890 and again in 1894 from Tahiti, though his early work showed a greater debt to Camille Pissarro and Alfred Sisley.
After a period of experimenting with Pointillism, Loiseau found his own interpretation of rural France. His canvases reveal an interest in creating a more melancholic vision, avoiding the intense light found in the work of the Impressionists; a renewed aesthetic sense characterised the stylistic path for expression, portraying the world not just by its physical appearance but by its inner realities.
Loiseau looked at nature with extraordinary sensitivity. His technique known as en treillis (or cross-hatching) gave his works a unique quality, now recognised as his speciality. This included defining structure and form with short brushstrokes of broken colour, placing him firmly within the Post-Impressionism movement.
His paintings are faithful witnesses of his travels. Of particular interest to Loiseau was the effect of changing light and seasons on a scene. He would return to particular locations time and time again to study and paint them in different conditions, drawing comparisons to Claude Monet.
The leading art collector and primary patron of the Impressionists, Paul Durand-Ruel, put the artist under his contract in 1897. This success enabled Loiseau to travel extensively to discover the regions of France, spending summers in Normandy, Brittany and occasionally the Dordogne, returning in winter to the Isle-de-France. In his later years, he divided his time between his studio in Pontoise and a new studio in Paris. He painted a series of works of the capital city, and it was there that he died in 1935.
Loiseau first exhibited at the Salon des Indépendants in 1893. From the end of the 19th century, he enjoyed great international success, with patrons in the United States and in Europe collecting his work. His paintings are represented in numerous museums, private collections and important galleries in Paris, the Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
If you are interested in purchasing his art, Willow Gallery holds a number of Gustave Loiseau paintings for sale.
Willow Gallery is a well-established business, having been trading solidly for over 30 years. During this period, the gallery is proud to have been elected to both the British Antique Dealers’ Association, and LAPADA, the Association of Art and Antiques Dealers. Both Associations operate codes of practice which aim to establish and maintain confidence between members and the public and are a reflection of our integrity and expertise.
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