The Collection of the Marquis de Gonet (1872-1925) In France in the early part of this century, it was relatively easy, given the means and a certain amount of taste, to acquire works of rare beauty. Certain collectors traveled across the Atlantic in order to meet important dealers such as Ambroise Vollard or Paul Guillaume, while others worked independently, allowing chance meetings in the annual Paris salons to guide them; it was thus that Vincent d'Indy and Marcel Proust first met Rodin. Two of the most important collections of this period hail from enlightened connoisseurs, both from the region of Béziers, neighbors as well as friends: the Marquis de Gonet and Gustave Fayet. The Marquis de Gonet was most impressed by the oeuvre of Odilon Redon, whose sensibility--shy, sensitive, generous--was perhaps closest to his own. Born into an influential family of magistrates from the Languedoc region, the de Gonets were directly involved in the development of the railroad linking Bordeaux, Toulouse and Marseille. Béziers at this time was a wealthy town, essentially dependent on the wine and spirit market, then at its apogée. The local theatre showed to a full house three times a week, to an audience more interested in the latest play than in their daily bread. It would appear that the Marquis de Gonet became a lawyer more out of respect for family tradition than out of personal conviction. He managed his career in his own way, choosing to plead a case in court only once. What may perhaps seem a manifestation of a certain nonchalance was in fact a choice of life-style, that of the Béziers bourgeoisie. Life was divided between the apartment on the Boulevard de Courcelles--barely 100 meters from that of Odilon Redon--where the Marquis and his family lived part of the year, and the beloved residence at Béziers where they spent the summer. "Work" as we define it today was never mentioned, and the Marquis spent his time in devotion to his wife and five children, and to music and singing. It was this love of music that brought both de Gonet and Fayet closer to Redon, whose own talents as a violinist were much appreciated. They shared a circle of friends that included the composer Deodat de Sévérac (a former student of the Marquis de Gonet then under the tutelage of Vincent d'Indy) and the pianist Ricardo Vines. Musical evenings were regularly organized either at Fayet's house or at Redon's, playing the works of Berlioz and Schubert as well as Debussy, Saint-Saens and Ravel. Gustave Fayet (1865-1925), the most talented eye of his generation, patronized Cézanne, Redon and particularly Gauguin. He was also to recognize early on the importance of van Gogh, Monet, Vuillard and Bonnard. It is quite remarkable to note that Fayet never actually met Gauguin, although a long correspondence between the two exists from the artist's years in exile in Tahiti and the Marquesas Islands. Fayet supported Gauguin with regular purchases (over 40 canvases in total) and even attempted to organize an exhibition of his works in 1902 at Béziers, far away from Paris where the painter was as yet unknown. The exquisite monotype Tahitienne vue de dos, unknown until today, is likely to have come from Gustave Fayet's collection, just as family legend tells us that Gauguin sent many sculptures and ceramics to his benefactor, wrapped up in his canvases and mailed through the post. The Fayet family fortune was made in the wine industry. Gustave Fayet was first initiated into the world of painting and drawing by his father, the artist Gabriel Fayet (1832-1899), who was a close friend and great collector of Adolphe Monticelli. Gustave Fayet launched his own career as a classical landscape painter but, upon discovering the works of Cézanne at an exhibition at Vollard, abandoned his own painting to devote himself to collecting. It was only in 1909 with the encouragement of Odilon Redon that he began to paint again. The town of Béziers houses a museum devoted to Fayet's own art. R This was above all a period shared with Gustave Fayet, their childhood friendship occupying a key place throughout the Marquis' life. For the Marquis' children, Gustave Fayet was "Oncle Gustave", and it was he who introduced de Gonet to his future wife, Henriette Malric. She was a virtuoso pianist from the powerful Periere banking family and from Languedoc as well. Fayet played matchmaker, discreetly leaving the two alone in the music room of his home on the rue de Capus. At their marriage in 1903, Redon was the Marquis de Gonet's witness, a sign of their close friendship. Inseparable, Gustave Fayet and the Marquis de Gonet spearheaded the creation of the "Chambre Musicale" of Béziers, and Gustave Fayet built the "Salle Berlioz" at Béziers in order to house the "Chambre Musicale." It was here that Fayet organized an exhibition of his private collection in the early 1900's. This was a critical moment at which the Marquis de Gonet was initiated into the world of the avante-garde, into the company of Degas, Renoir, Gauguin, Redon, Rodin, Injalbert and even Picasso. The ardent friendship between Odilon Redon and the Marquis de Gonet began at Fayet's home a few kilometers from Béziers, the Abbey of Fontfroide. Redon was a frequent visitor to the Abbey of Fontfroide, and Fayet commissioned him to paint the library there. The Abbey of Fontfroide, built in the twelfth century near Narbonne, was abandoned during the separation between the church and the French state in 1905. Fayet, a champion of his native region and its patrimony, purchased the estate in 1908 in order to preserve this unique property. Intimately involved with the project of restoring the abbey, Fayet invited his friends to participate in his new passion. While Fayet was designing the stained glass of the church, other artists were participating in his utopic vision; from 1910 to 1911, for example, Redon painted two enormous panels (6.5 x 2 meters) on a theme that obsessed him, "Le Jour et la Nuit." In these panels, the friends who came to sit for Redon are represented as flames with human heads, reminding Redon of the nocturnal fires he witnessed along the walls of the old abbey. The Marquis de Gonet appears in the face of Saint Antoine on the panel of "Day," while Sévérac and Vinès, Fayet and his children, as well as Camille and Ari Redon, can be identified on the panel of "Night." In 1907 Gustave Fayet commissioned Redon to paint the portrait of his wife and two daughters. At the same time, Redon painted a portrait of Geneviève de Gonet, aged 3. Redon portrays Geneviève caught between wisdom and innocence--a little girl to the artist's taste. As he once said, "J'aime les fillettes, je vois en elles toute la femme sans y trouver une femme et c'est exquis. Celui qui compliquerait cet aveu et l'accueillerait d'un sourire ne saurait pas ce qui réside en la grâce. La grâce est révélatrice d'infinies virtuosités et d'ine vie en puissance qui fait le charme de la vie par l'esprit par les yeux." Redon's portraits of children are much more inspired than his portraits of adults, which seem to have an air of borrowed sophistication. Above all, the Marquis and Redon shared a passion for mysticism, popular at the time in France. A lonely childhood spent in the gloomy Château de Peyrelebade is the obvious source for this disquieting world, populated by the monsters of the artist's imagination. It was with relief that Redon's family home was sold in 1898. This date marks a definitive break from the "Noirs," those mysterious, dark charcoals and inks, and the discovery of color and the celebration of flowers which gave such pleasure to the Marquis de Gonet. In one of two works published by the Marquis de Gonet there is a poem entitled "Les épines d'Odilon Redon": Ses méditations sur la pierre ont été Des regards de voyant vers l'enugme du monde Les noirs où s'exprimea sa sagesse profonde Paraissent une angoisse et sont une clarté. The Marquis de Gonet died in 1925, followed one month later by his friend Gustave Fayet. The latter's fantastic collection was sold shortly after his death and the major works can be found today in museums around the world. The family of the Marquis de Gonet, respectful of the tremendous friendship between their ancestor and Fayet, have conserved up until this moment the works of art that bear witness to a now distant and very different era. (fig. 1) Portrait of the Marquis Jean de Gonet, circa 1920 (fig. 2) Drawing of ?????

Odilon Redon (1840-1916)

Fleurs

Details

Odilon Redon (1840-1916)
Fleurs
signed bottom right 'ODILON REDON'
pastel on joined paper
18 7/8 x 11 in. (47.8 x 28 cm.)

Provenance

Acquired from the artist by the Marquis de Gonet between 1907-1910
By descent to the present owners

Exhibited

Paris, Galerie Barbazanges, Exposition rétrospective d'oeuvres d'Odilon Redon (1840-1916), May-June, 1920, no. 105

Further details

See seperate catalogue.

Sale room notice

Please note this pastel is mounted at the edges on paper.

Lot Essay

A photo-certificate from the Wildenstein Institute dated Paris, September 8, 1997 accompanies this pastel, which will be included in the forthcoming volume IV of their Redon catalogue raisonné.