Jacques Wely (1873-1910) - Homework, Circa 1900

Jacques Wely (1873-1910)
LES DEVOIRS, CIRCA 1900
Oil on canvas
50 x 61 cm
(64 x 75 cm with the frame)
Signed lower right

Additional photos on request

After trying a commercial career in China, he signed in 1896 in Paris his first "Made" drawings then met Edmond Vernier who signed "Dola": the duo then produced illustrations under the name of "Madola" intended for operetta librettos, which they first produced in their lithographic workshop . Between 1897 and 1904, under the sole pen name "Jacques Wély", he executed a certain number of sheet music covers, among others for the Parisian publisher Enoch. Around the same time, he delivered an increasing number of caricatures to most satirical and light-hearted newspapers. He also engages in the production of paintings, offering for example 12 paintings at the Salon des humoristes in 1909. Member of the National Society of Fine Arts, his gouaches show scenes of humorous or tender couples, portraits of women, some natures dead, which are sometimes in line with post-impressionism. In 1908, he opened a new workshop in Montfort-l'Amaury, but, suffering from tuberculosis, he died two years later. Illustrator for the publishing and press houses Rouff, Albin Michel, Jules Tallandier and Pierre Lafitte, he became an essential caricaturist in their periodicals.