”ANDALOUSIAN PARTY”, OIL ON TABLEX, JEAN-LOUIS PAGUENAUD (1876-1952).

“Andalusian Festival”, oil on tablex, Jean-Louis Paguenaud (1876-1952). Signed and dedicated (“cantatrice Dupré”) in the lower right corner. Jean-Louis Paguenaud is the pseudonym of Jean-Philippe Paguenaud (1876-1952). He spent his childhood in Algiers, where he discovered the sea. When his father moved to Limoges, he studied at the School of Decorative Arts and worked in a porcelain factory. He furthered his training with William Bouguereau, delving into the world of seascapes and undertook numerous trips to Martinique and North Africa, which he captured in gouaches and drawings, which he exhibited in 1905 at the Salon des Indépendants. His brother Joseph-Louis was killed in combat in 1914 and, to honour his memory, he decided to sign his work with one of the deceased's names. Appointed Official Painter of the French Navy in 1922, he lived for a time in Paris before returning to Limoges. He took part in a famous voyage on the ship “Lamotte-Piquet”, which took him to Central and South America. His career can be divided into three periods: his training period (1876-1902), the “orientalist” period (1902-1921) and a third period (1921-1942), when he became an official painter for the Navy; he produced a few more works between 1942 and 1952. His work can be seen in important private collections and in museums such as the Navy Museum in Paris, the Naval School in Bourdeaux, the Town Hall of Coussac-Bonneval, etc. The present work shows an exterior, a square in an Andalusian village, with a large number of characters dressed in the regional costume of the area celebrating a great festival. The movement is provided by couples and groups dancing in the centre, an orchestra on the left, diners on the right and several couples riding horses throughout the composition. This whole scene shares the spotlight with the landscape: the façade of a church stands before a house and an old bridge, with a mountain in the background under a blue sky. Several characteristics of Paguenaud's work can be clearly appreciated: the light, which he would have taken from Algiers and from all his travels; the compositional mastery with which he knows how to place a large number of figures; the blue sky, which is also seen in his seascapes, etc. Likewise, it is necessary to highlight the originality of the oil painting in the painter's artistic career due to its subject matter.

· Size: 233x5x175 int 213x152 cms