Isidore Pils (1815-1875) The Death Of A Sister Of Religious Charity

Isidore PILS
(1815, Paris - 1875, Douarnenez)
The death of a sister of charity
Pastel and black chalk
H. 42 cm; L. 57 cm
1849/1850
Period black and gold frame

Related works: painting exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1850 under No. 2475, titled The death of a sister of charity, part of which our drawing is preparatory - The painting (2.41 x 3.05 m) is kept at the Musée des Augustins de Toulouse

Provenance: sale of the Pils workshop, March 20, 1876, Paris, Drouot, lot N ° 417 of the catalog titled La Mère saint-Prosper on her deathbed, study for The Death of a Sister of Charity

This admirable drawing, with a strong presence and emitting great emotion, which can be compared to the Ex-voto of 1662 by Philippe de Champaigne (museum du Louvre), is a study for Pils's painting from the Salon of 1850, Death of a Sister of Charity, acquired by the State in 1851. The painted sketch of the painting and several studies (oils and two drawings) were presented at the posthumous exhibition of Pils organized at the School of Fine Arts in Paris in 1876. The painted study of the head of Mother Saint-Prosper, lot N ° 418 of the Fri te Pils, 56 x 45 cm, is kept at the Magnin museum in Dijon. The theme of the painting was linked to Pils' personal life: it was inspired by the death of Sister Saint-Prosper, from whom he had personally received care during a six-month stay at Saint-Louis hospital in beginning of 1845. Grateful, he had gone, when the nun died on August 30, 1846, to kneel at the foot of the bed where her body was exposed, and he had been touched by the sight of the poor people coming to contemplate one last time that who was a mother to them. The work was a great public and critical success, noted in particular by Delecluze and the Goncourt brothers, who distinguish it as "one of the best paintings of the last Salon" in number 25 (June 26, 1852) of L'Eclair (weekly review of literature, theaters and the arts). This painting belongs to the beginning of Pils' career, before he devotes himself definitively (himself being the son of a soldier) to the military genre and to great decoration.

A pupil of Guillon-Lethière then of Picot, Pils produced on his return from Italy, where he had spent six years since 1839, several works with a religious theme. He had started at the Salon of 1846 with Christ preaching in the boat of Simon and The death of Saint Madeleine, the latter being acquired by the State. In 1850, he also exhibited a Holy Family, and finally The Prayer at the Hospice, at the Salon of 1853 (this painting, also known as The Prayer of the Teignous Children, was offered by the Empress Eugenie to the hospital of sick children, the Sainte-Eugénie hospital which later became the Trousseau hospital; when it was demolished in 1902, the painting was transported to the Saint-Louis hospital and is now kept at the Museum of Public Assistance) . Note, however, a last religious “revival” at the Salon of 1874 with Holy Thursday in Italy, in a Dominican convent.