Drawing By Henri Royer - Breton Women Watching The Boats Depart

Henri ROYER (Nancy 1869-1938 Neuilly-sur-Seine) Breton women attending the departure of the boatscirca 1900pen and black ink wash25 x 32 cmsigned and dedicated 'Henri Royer/ Souvenir d'Audierne'Henri Royer, son of the Nancy printer Jean Royer, joined Jules Lefevre's workshop at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris in 1887. He also undertook several trips alongside Émile Friant, his true mentor, who took him to Belgium, Holland, Italy and the Côte d'Azur. Based in Paris from 1890, he regularly participated in the Salon. In 1896, he discovered Brittany, a land where his naturalism and faith could fully express themselves. The sheet presented to you constitutes a preparatory study for the painting Breton women attending the departure of the boats, preserved at the Museum of Fine Arts in Nancy. It reveals Henri Royer's attention to the Breton popular life that he frequented and observed during his regular stays in Audierne and Concarneau, in particular. Our drawing brings together several figures of women in traditional headdresses and sailors, grouped in the foreground on the shore. With anxious gaze and directed towards the open sea, three young girls, certainly from the same family, scrutinize the departure of the fishing boats in which there is certainly a father or an older brother, almost abandoning their manual work. Behind them, two young sailors imitate them and seem to imagine what their life will be like, while in the background we can make out the sails of the fishing boats leaving the port. The artist focuses here on the study of attitudes and the distribution of groups, translating everyday expressions and gestures with a nervous and precise line. This preparatory work testifies to Royer's rigorous method, which involves numerous character studies before composing his genre scenes, characterized by their realism and humanity. We find in this sketch the artist's taste for compositions where the relationship to the sea and the village community occupies a central place.