Emile Chaumont (1877-1927) Village In Périgord

Emile CHAUMONT

(Périgueux 1877 - 1927)

Village en Périgord

Oil on panel

H. 24 cm; L. 33 cm

Signed lower left

Provenance : Private collection, Périgueux

The Saint-Georges district of Périgueux was the birthplace and home of this poetic painter. After a classical education, he was forced to leave high school on the death of his parents to pursue a gainful occupation. His older brother and tutor, aware of his keen interest in drawing, allowed him to learn lithography at the Dupont printing works.

Mobilized for the whole of the war from 1915 onwards, Emile Chaumont distinguished himself by his "remarkable attitude of energy and drive", returning from the front with the Croix de Guerre. It was on his return that he decided to move to Bordeaux and the Pech printing works. Certainly a painter before, it was at this time that he really began to devote all his spare time to his passion. A pupil of Perigordian Léon Félix and Professor Albert Laurens, whose inspiration is palpable, Chaumont's art evolved under his own ideas.

He followed Jean-Louis Daniel to Corrèze, criss-crossed Périgord and the Landes of Gironde. His luminous landscapes, always in a full range of colors, were a real success, even winning an honorable mention at the Salon des Artistes Français. In addition to these landscapes, Emile Chaumont produced numerous portraits and still lifes of remarkable quality.

He died aged just fifty in the Saint-Georges district where he was born, in the home of his brother Léopold Chaumont, director of the newspaper l'Avenir de la Dordogne, after long suffering from an incurable disease. The town of Périgueux dedicated a posthumous exhibition to him in 1946, to critical acclaim, and gave his native district a street named after the artist.

This panel, which has been preserved with another landscape of the same format since the beginning, is not part of a pair as such. It depicts the outskirts of a village, with the church tower standing out. This type of steeple is typical of the Périgueux area (Marsac, Boulazac, Chancelade...) but we have not identified the parish in question.

The other work, dedicated "to the friend Francis", is a lively landscape of a man in a straw hat.