Les affiches électorales, square Berlioz

Painted in 1924, Edouard Vuillard’s Les affiches électorales, square Berlioz offers both an affectionate view of the artist’s neighbourhood and a record of contemporary events. Vuillard, who mentioned this work in several journal entries from April that year, has painted Square Berlioz – located in Paris’ ninth arrondissement – as a warmly illuminated gathering spot. Illuminated by warm sunshine, the people in the square lounge on benches, chatting, reading, and caring for children. The greenery is the balmy spring air, and the city peaceful and quiet. Vuillard’s pallet reveals a range of colours as the sun sweeps across the expanse of the square.

In the foreground several red election posters can be seen hanging from the railings. These were put up for the elections of 11 May 1924, in which the Cartel des Gauches, a coalition of leftwing parties, would ultimately prove victorious. Since the advent of chromolithography in the mid-eighteenth century, Paris had become a city awash in posters. Artists such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Pierre Bonnard, and Vuillard all embraced the new print-making technology, but it was its impact on the cityscape itself that perhaps would leave the greatest mark. The poster quickly became the desirable means for all sorts of advertisements from the newly constructed department stores to performances at the Moulin Rouge and electoral campaigns. Vuillard would have witnessed the transformation of the Parisian streetscape to one of great . By the time he painted Les affiches électorales, square Berlioz, this visual spectacle would have become the norm.

Vuillard had moved into his apartment overlooking the square in 1908. Not only was the small park an oasis of calm for Parisians, children, and visitors but it also proved to present the artist with a wellspring of inspiration. Over the subsequent years, Vuillard would devote countless hours to painting, drawing, and photographing the square from every possible vantage point. Several of these works are now in museum collections including Place Vintimille, 1909-1910, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and La démolition du 26 rue de Calais, 1928, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Pau).

Les affiches électorales, square Berlioz was previously in the collection of Prince Antoine Bibesco. His mother, Princesse Helene Bibesco, hosted a celebrated Parisian salon that was frequented by such luminaries as Claude Debussy, Pierre Bonnard, Aristide Maillol, Marcel Proust, and Vuillard, among others. In addition to the present work, Prince Bibesco also acquired several other paintings by Vuillard including Femme lisant sur un banc 1898, Au theatre, 1895, and Le Massif circa 1907, among others, as well as works by Odilon Redon, Edgar Degas, and Bonnard.