Fernand Herbo (1905-1995) Moulin De Le Folie Crozant ~1945. Osterlind Vlaminck Friesz, Honfleur

A rare and large oil on canvas by Fernand Herbo depicting the Moulin de la Folie on the Sedelle River in Crozant, circa 1945, signed lower right with a marine anchor, and also located and countersigned on the reverse. The canvas measures 60 x 81 cm (excluding the frame). This is indeed a very rare canvas by Fernand Herbo depicting the Moulin de la Folie in Crozant, painted around 1945, as the canvas bears the marine anchor and the painter was appointed an official painter of the French Navy in 1944. I say rare because to date, only three examples of the painter's presence in the Creuse Valley are known: this one, another mill in Crozant sold in 2024 at Drouot, and a large canvas depicting a view of La Celle Dunoise sold for €2,300 in 1998 at Pillon. Herbo employs his usual powerful yet subtle brushstrokes and palette, typical of his work, where one senses Of course, the influence of masters and friends such as Vlaminck, Othon-Friesz, Osterlind... Fernand Herbo was a painter and lithographer from Montmartre, based in Honfleur (Calvados), born in Orchies on March 28, 1905 and died in Équemauville on August 21, 1995. He was appointed painter to the French Navy in 1944. His early passion for drawing diverted Fernand Herbo from a career in the railways, to which his father, himself a railway worker, had destined him. During his youth in Montmartre, he created posters, set designs for theater and film, and associated with painters such as Maurice de Vlaminck and Othon Friesz. Fernand Herbo - Lively Street, 1926. In 1938, Herbo left his home at 256 rue Marcadet in the 18th arrondissement of Paris and settled permanently in Honfleur. His powerful work, imbued with dark colors and dedicated to the sea, ships, and ports, earned him the title of official painter of the French Navy in 1944. It was from this date that the traditional anchor of the French Navy painters was added to his signature. In 1945, the French state acquired his work *Le quai de Jemmapes* (1942) and donated it to the National Museum of Modern Art at the Centre Georges Pompidou. In the early 1950s, Fernand Herbo met the French gallery owner and poet Katia Granoff, who exhibited his work in her new gallery in Honfleur. Granoff, a great discoverer of talent (she exhibited and launched the careers of Marc Chagall and Othon Friesz, among others, and promoted the rediscovery of Claude Monet's Water Lilies series), thus introduced the Seine Estuary School, of which Fernand Herbo was a leading figure. In 1952, Fernand Herbo and his wife Micheline opened the Bar des Artistes in Honfleur (located at 14 Place Berthelot; it is now the Bistrot des Artistes), whose ceiling was entirely decorated by Herbo and above which was his studio. The Bar des Artistes then became a meeting place for Honfleur's painters. It is estimated that Fernand Herbo produced over a thousand works, primarily oil paintings and watercolors. A favored setting for his painting, the town of Honfleur paid tribute to him by naming one of its quays after him. Montmartre, sites in the Vendée (Saint-Gilles-sur-Vie) and the Lot region also feature among his subjects. In his later years, Fernand Herbo and his wife Micheline settled in Vasouy in a barn that had belonged to Jean-Louis Barrault and Madeleine Renaud, which he converted into a home. He died on August 21, 1995[11] and is buried in the Vasouy cemetery in Honfleur. This canvas is in perfect original condition, currently delivered unframed, but I will check tomorrow if I have one in stock. The artwork is guaranteed authentic.