Charles-Edouard de Beaumont
Spring Scene, ca. 1860.
Oil on canvas
Signed lower left
Dimensions: 46 x 38 cm
With frame : 65,5 x 59 cm
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Mythological subject, scene of seduction, atmosphere and spring colors, a delicate and sensitive charm emanates from these two young girls, thinning out flowers in a garden; next to them stands a young man with a mandolin.
The subject is pleasant, the colors fresh and delicate, the composition subtle.
The swans sailing in the foreground seem to be a clue left by the painter to illustrate this story. The floral arrangements are neat, the sky clear and bright, the light diffuse. Some decorative elements enrich a very classical composition. The clothes of the young women seem to float in the wind, light like everything around them. They themselves are surely intoxicated by a sweet perfume which is not accessible to us, this young musician is certainly unknown to them and comes to court them, like an audacious suitor.
Painter of religious subjects, genre, landscapes.
Watercolourist, draughtsman, illustrator and lithographer.
Son of a sculptor, he was educated by the painter Boisselier. If he models a few statuettes, he has an attraction for painting from an early age. He began his career as a landscape painter at the Salon of 1838. Thereafter, he undertook a trip to Italy until 1847. From then on, he made genre paintings.
In addition to his career as a painter, he is a collector of old weapons. He wrote two books on their iconography and gave his collection to the Musée de Cluny at his death. When he is not painting or collecting, he participates in the social and bourgeois life of society. He founded the Society of Watercolourists with his painter friend, Vibert.
Beaumont’s reputation rests primarily on his watercolors and his lithographic and illustrative work. Lithographer, he belongs to the galaxy of talents selected by the publisher Aubert. As a watercolourist, however, his style is very personal, and it’s safe to say that his work has pushed the boundaries of his field.
Museums:
. Museum of Fine Arts and David D’Angers Gallery; Museum of Fine Arts of Tours; National Center of Plastic Arts of Paris
. Mâcon, Ursulines museum
. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Department of Graphic Arts
Bibliography:
. art. “Charles-Édouard de Beaumont”, Bénézit, Oxford Art Online, 2011
. Étienne Arago, Notice des peintures, sculptures et dessins de l’École moderne : exposés dans les galeries du Musée national du Luxembourg, 1886, p. 3
