Emile Ralambo Animated Lake Scene In Madagascar Watercolor And Gouache Early 20th Century

Emile Ralambo (1879-1963)

Animated scene on a lake in Madagascar

Watercolor and gouache on paper, signature lower right E Ralambo

Good condition.

Dimensions:
with frame: 43.5 x 61 cm
at sight: 25.5 x 43 cm

Emile RALAMBO born in ANTANANARIVO in 1879 in a family of eight children. Son of RAINIZANANY RAKOTOVAO and RAZAFINDRASOALANDY he is the son-in-law of the historian composer RAINITOVO and belongs to the Zanadralambo caste. From a very early age, his taste for painting was noticed by his parents. His brothers like him to draw and paint. Albert RASAMOELY (naive style), and Joseph RAZAFITSEHENO (Baroque style), are however less well known than him. Self-taught, he never had a painting teacher and never attended a Fine Arts school. He learns to draw and paint on his own by observing nature and reproducing famous paintings. At the beginning, he uses crushed leaves and flowers to color his drawings, it is only later that he can buy boxes of colors. Alongside his studies, all his leisure time is spent drawing and painting. This is how he perfected himself little by little and in 1897, he was able to happily sell his first paintings when he was still only a student. His studies finished, he entered as a teacher in the Protestant missionary schools, and this, for more than thirty years in the province of Fianarantsoa. Later he devoted himself to his passion: painting. His paintings represent: landscapes of Madagascar, characteristic scenes of Malagasy life (transplanting of rice, circumcision, exhumation, landscape of ox carts, etc.) portraits of Malagasy types which have an incredible finesse and resemble almost photographic documents which give them ethnographic value. They are executed from photographs or real models. Meticulous, sometimes maniacal, we would gladly classify him among the "hyper-realists" close to a certain painting of the American School. He participates in various exhibitions in Madagascar and abroad. He obtained a gold medal in Antananarivo in 1952, as well as that of the city of Vichy which crowned him in 1960. One of his works is kept at the Museum of Versailles. Another adorns the stamp of the Festivals of Negro Arts in Dakar in 1966. Elsewhere, the painter RALAMBO Emile holds the Gold Medal, Antananarivo Fair 1947, the Academic Palms in 1950, the Merit of Madagascar and the Medal of Honor. RALAMBO recognized as one of the best watercolorists of his time died in Antananarivo in 1963 after a busy life of 84 years.