Ernest Ponthier De Chamaillard "the Lavender On The Aven"

Ernest Ponthier DE CHAMAILLARD (1862-1930) "The washerwomen on the Aven" Oil on canvas signed lower left and dated 1895, (canvas 43.5 x 61 cm). Ernest Ponthier de Chamaillard was born on December 9, 1862 in Gourlizon near Quimper in a family of old Breton stock with a monarchist tendency. Returned from the Jesuits of Vannes for his nonconformism, he studied law in Rennes. More attracted by art, poets and distractions than by his records, he is hunted by creditors and submitted to a judicial council by his family. The family tensions are at their height when he meets in 1886 during his first stay in Pont-Aven Louise Lamour, whom he later married in Jersey, against the family opinion because his fiancée was only the niece of the family. recipient of the Postes de Pont-Aven. In 1888, he met Paul Gauguin at an auction at Henan Castle near Pont-Aven. Very happy to abandon the law, attracted by painting and an enthusiastic character, Chamaillard seduced Gauguin who wrote to E. Schuffenecker August 14, 1888: "I started a student who will walk, the band increases." Fascinated by the personality of the master, it binds with the painters of the group of the school of Pont-Aven which is at the time a very renowned artistic center and quickly integrates the group of which Gauguin is the undisputed leader. All appreciate him for his generosity, his good mood, his particular literary culture and sensitivity. The following years, he found the Master at Pouldu at the Auberge de la Plage at Marie Henry's. Impressionist artist in his painting and synthetist in his watercolors, Chamaillard also reveals his talent in his objects or carved furniture. In 1893, unable to live by his painting or sculpture, he moved to Chateaulin and practiced as an attorney. The following year, his brother Henri is Gauguin's lawyer in the case against Marie Henry: the artist wanted to recover the works left to the Auberge de la Plage in 1890: it will be dismissed by the court. In 1901, the first personal exhibition at Vollard, in the 1900s, Chamaillard surrounds himself with artists whom he knew well in Pont-Aven as Seguin, Sérusier, Moret, Guillaumin, Maufra, Jourdan or Slewinski in Chateaulin then in his mansion of Gourlizon. But in 1905, his prodigality towards his friends left him without resources and forced him to go to Paris, where he would occupy a modest office job. In 1906 and 1910, Arsène Alexandre, famous art critic, preface the catalogs of his exhibitions at Bernheim Jeune. In the autumn of 1914, Guillaume Apollinaire, a friend and collector of the artist's watercolors, had written the preface for a solo exhibition that was to take place at Ambroise Vollard's, but was canceled because of the war. Two exhibitions at Georges Petit Gallery in 1925 and 1930 and regular appearances at the Salon d'Automne from 1903 to 1925 made him an artist recognized by the public. After losing his two sons at the front, Ernest Chamaillard died in Eaubonne in 1931.