"melancholy" By Lazar Meyer 1873

Oil on canvas signed lower right Lazar-Meyer and dated 1873 depicting an intimate scene from the Second Empire, including an old restoration, two pieces of reinforcement on the back. Superb quality of execution in the details, the delicacy of the lines and in the rendering of the silk of the dress. Beautiful Empire frame in wood and gilded stucco. Dimensions of the canvas 66x45 cm Total dimensions, with frame, 77.5x56.5 cm. Lazar Meyer was born in Fegersheim on January 20, 1847 to Israel Meyer and Charlotte Metzger, a Jewish family established in Fegersheim (Bas-Rhin), near Strasbourg. He has three brothers (Abraham, David and Leopold) and two sisters (Marie and Babette). Following the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 and the occupation of Alsace-Lorraine by the German Empire, he left, for political and religious reasons, to settle in Paris with his older brother Léopold. He moved to 3 rue Cauchois, in the 18th arrondissement. He participates in the Commune, where he is secretary of a section. Following the crushing of the Communards, he was arrested and imprisoned opposite the Île de Ré (Fort Boyard), from where he was to be deported. As he never took up arms, the court finally acquits him and he returns to Paris. He married in 1880 in Paris with Louise Albertine Macé, with whom he had three children: Éva (1879), Léa (1882) and Israël Maurice (1885). He showed very early on a taste and a confirmed talent for art and painting. He first studied with Alexandre Laemlein (1813-1871) and established himself as a genre and portrait painter. At the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, he studied with Alexandre Cabanel (1823-1889) and Émile Lévy (1826-1890). He became a drawing teacher at the Lycée Condorcet in Paris. In collaboration with the earthenware maker Jules Paul Loebnitz, he produced, from drawings by Émile Lévy, three large ceramic panels intended to adorn the monumental porch of the pavilion of the French section of fine arts at the 1878 Universal Exhibition. from Paris2. They represent Architecture, Painting and Sculpture. Completed by a fourth panel, they were later reassembled in Paris on the facade of the former Loebnitz earthenware factory, built in 1884 by the architect Paul Sédille. He is one of the first painters of Montmartre and considered a precursor of the School of Paris. He was close to the painter and portrait painter Albert Besnard (1849-1934). Lazar Meyer exhibited at the Paris Salon from 1870 to 1882. Several of his works were destroyed or vandalized during World War II. He died on January 28, 1935 in Paris.