Tambour-major de l'armée française donnant à manger aux pigeons de la place Saint-Marc à Venise

Details

GEORGES-JULES-VICTOR CLAIRIN (FRENCH, 1843-1919)
Tambour-major de l'armée française donnant à manger aux pigeons de la place Saint-Marc à Venise
signed 'G. Clairin.' (lower left)
oil on canvas
51 x 31 7⁄8 in. (129.5 x 81 cm.)

Provenance

(possibly) Anonymous sale; Hôtel Drouot, Paris, 12 April 1894, lot 22, as Épisode de l'occupation de Venise par l'armée française sous le Premier Empire.
Carlos Juan Gonzalez, Mexico, circa 1960.
Acquired directly from the above by the present owner, 2012.

Literature

'Chronique Artistique', La Chronique universelle, December 1890, pp. 243-244, as L'Armée française à Venise.
'Gazette du Jour', La Justice, 3 February 1891, p. 3, as L'Armée française à Venise.
A. de la Pérelle, 'A ‘L’Épatant’, L'exposition du Circle de la rue Boissy-d'Anglas', La Presse, 4 February 1891, n.p., as L'Armée française à Venise.
'L'Union Artistique', La Lanterne, Paris, 4 February 1891, p. 3, as L'Armée française à Venise.
H. Dac, 'Lettres et Arts, Trois Petites Salons', Le Monde, Paris 9 February 1891, n. p., as L'Armée française à Venise.
R. O'Monroy, 'Courrier de Paris,' L'Univers illustré, Paris, vol. 34, no. 1873, 14 February 1891, p. 82, as L'Armée française à Venise.
V. Fournel, 'Les oeuvres et les hommes', Le correspondant, vol. 162, Paris, 25 February 1891, p. 761, as L'Armée française à Venise.
F. Mugnoz, 'Beaux-Arts, Exposition Annuelle du Cercle L'Union artistique', La Mode de Style, vol. 16, no. 11, 11 March 1891, p. 88, as L'Armée française à Venise.
'Fine Art, The Continental Gallery', The Bazar, The Exchange, and Mart, 6 April 1892, as Tambour Major Feeding Pigeons at St. Mark's.
Harper's New Monthly Magazine, New York, 1892, illustrated, as The French Army in Venice, 1797.
'Les artists français à Chicago', Journal des Artistes, vol. 12, no. 4, 22 January 1893, p. 26, as Tambour-Major.
Leslie's Monthly Magazine, New York, May 1894, p. 601, illustrated, as Bonaparte's soldiers and the Pigeons of St. Mark's.

Exhibited

Paris, Cercle L'Union artistique, 1891, no. 106, as L'Armée française à Venise.
London, The Continental Gallery, Annual Exhibition of Paintings from the Paris Salons, 1892, as Tambour Major Feeding Pigeons at St. Mark's.
Chicago, World's Columbian Exposition, 1893, no. 381 (no. 124 in the French Section).

Engraved

Charles Baude, The French Army in Venice, 1797 - In the Piazza of St. Mark, 1892.

Conditions of sale

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Lot Essay

Georges Clairin’s wide-ranging œuvre spanned from Orientalism to Symbolism, to his famous portraits of Sarah Bernhardt, with whom he enjoyed a 50-year friendship. Well-traveled and rightfully famous within his lifetime, he remains a frustratingly difficult artist to categorize today. The present work is one of at least three works painted by Clairin which relate to the French siege of Venice in 1797. Painted in the early 1890s, it’s possible they were produced for the upcoming centennial of the invasion. The three identified works depict soldiers setting up an encampment in front of St. Mark’s, a depiction of French soldiers inside the Basilica (exhibited at the Salon of 1890 and now held in the Musée Massey) and the present work (exhibited at the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893). Perhaps the most enigmatic of the three, the present work depicts a drum major standing at the base of one of the three flag poles that stand in front of the Basilica surrounded by the square’s famous pigeons, with the French army in the background. Should the viewer be distracted by the whimsy of the scene, Clairin points a cannon straight out at the viewer from the background to remind us that this is, in fact, a war.
The picture was requested for the exhibition ‘Napoleon and Venice’ which was to be held at the Istituto Veneto di Scienze Letteratura e Arti in late 2021, but was regrettably canceled due to pandemic restrictions.

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