2 Color Lithographs Of Eugène Déveria, Guide And Washerwoman In Eaux-bonnes Pyrénées, 19th Century

Couple of Eaux-Bonnes in the Pyrenees by Eugène Déveria (1805-1865) 19th century framed lithographs Lithographs made by E. Vignancour at A. Bassy near the Place Royale in Pau High mountain guide against a Pyrenean landscape Washerwoman in typical costume Fresh colors Very nice frame Very good general condition length: 58.5 cm each width: 46.3 cm each View: 37.5 x 25.1 cm each Biography: Eugène Devéria was born in Paris on April 22, 1805. He is the son of François-Marie Devéria, office manager at the Ministry of the Navy and Désirée François-Chaumont, originally from Saint-Domingue, whose family was ruined by the Revolution. The Devéria family had five children: Achille, Désirée, Octavie, Eugène and Laure. This large family, with modest incomes, was quickly taken in by Achille, whose talents as an illustrator and hard work ensured a regular income. It was a family of artists, with not only Achille and Eugène, but also Laure, the youngest, who showed real talent as a draughtsman and exhibited successfully at the Salon. She died prematurely in May 1838. In the 1820s and 1830s, the Devérias' Parisian home attracted artists and musicians: "Romanticism was at home...", the poet Théophile Gautier, a great friend of Eugène, would recall years later. Eugène Devéria showed a precocious talent for drawing; his brother Achille, whose pupil he was, first got him into the Beaux-Arts in Paris, where he studied under Girodet-Trioson and Guillaume Guillon Lethière. The only known Academy of the artist is preserved at the Bertrand Museum in Châteauroux. Eugène Devéria's first submissions to the Salon date from 1824, where they were little noticed. In 1827, however, his monumental painting The Birth of Henri IV was a triumph. His studio was located at 7 rue de l'Est, in the house of the sculptor Cartellier, where the sculptor Louis Petitot also lived; the artist occupied the fourth-floor studio that he shared with Louis Boulanger, who was finishing his Mazeppa, while Eugène worked on his Birth of Henri IV. Eugène, who had been assiduously visiting Victor Hugo since 1824 with his brother Achille, was inspired, for the subject of his painting, by a short story by Abel Hugo, Victor's brother, published in Le Conservateur littéraire in 1820. Eugène Devéria was, at this time, one of the most promising figures of the nascent Romanticism. No beginning was more brilliant or made such promises. It was rightly believed, when The Birth of Henry IV was exhibited, that France was going to have its Paul Veronese and that a great colorist had arrived. "The artist who began with this masterstroke was barely twenty-two years old...", wrote Théophile Gautier in 1874 in his History of Romanticism. Following this success, the young painter received numerous official commissions: a painting, intended for the ceiling of a room in the Louvre, entitled Puget Presenting his Milo of Croton to Louis XIV, portraits of historical figures for the Museum of the History of France that Louis-Philippe wanted to create at Versailles; He participated in the construction of the Notre-Dame-de-Lorette church in Paris and that of Fougères in Brittany… But the triumph of 1827 was not repeated, he accepted, in 1838, the proposal to leave the capital for Avignon, where he was asked to redo all the painted decoration of the Notre-Dame-des-Doms cathedral. The scale of the task, the unsanitary conditions of the place and a dramatic flood exhausted the painter who, sick and weakened, left the papal city to recover in Béarn. In Orthez, he sketched the portrait of two locally well-known Protestants whom he visited several times: the pastor Jacques Reclus and his wife Zéline. In 1849 he painted the portrait of their son Élisée Reclus. In 1841, cured, he settled permanently in Pau where he remained until his death. He brought his family there: his wife Caroline-Aglaé Lavie du Rauzel, his daughter Marie (1831-1856) and his niece Carry Chaumont, whom he raised as his own child. In 1845, another of his nephews, Théodule, joined this blended family for several years. To support his household, Eugène Devéria gave drawing lessons, painted portraits of wealthy winter residents in Pau or, during the summer, went to the spa resort of Eaux-Bonnes, offering portraits and small picturesque scenes to spa guests. He devoted many of his works to the Pyrenees, genre scenes and portraits. At the same time, he regularly continued to send paintings to Paris. His last submission to the Salon was in 1861: The Reception of Christopher Columbus by Ferdinand and Isabelle. Eugène Devéria died suddenly in Pau on February 3, 1865