Watercolour and graphite on paper

39.8 × 26.5 cm. 15 5/8 × 10 3/8 in.

Signed in French and dated on bottom right
PROVENANCE
Pre – 1980s, Christie's Paris Auctions
Private collection, Europe
Private collection, Asia

Tall Oak is Superior to the Crowd, Accompanying me to the Faraway Places
The Masterpiece of French Expressionist Bernard Buffet

“No artist anywhere has ever been as popular in his lifetime as Buffet…Today, we could compare him to Jeff Koons or Takashi Murakami, but neither has achieved Buffet's universal popularity.”
–——F. Hergott, famous art historian and curator of the Paris Museum of Modern Art quoted in New York Times, 20 October 2016

In the mid-twentieth century, Bernard Buffet became the most sensational painter in Paris after Picasso, and almost everyone knew him. From 1952 to 1958, his regular painting exhibitions held every February were a hot topic among people daily. Paris newspapers once said, “It's like the living situation of fashion companies in Paris exhibiting new season fashion shows. Everyone is extremely curious about Buffet's new work!”

Pure Genius, the Existence of a Unique One

Buffet is a pure genius. He was admitted to the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts at the age of 15 and was selected as the participant of the Salon des Moins de Trente Ans for his work Self-Portrait at the age of 18. He held his first solo exhibition at the age of 19, won the Prix de la critique at the age of 20, and was selected as one of the “Top 10 Post-War Artists” by Cognitive Art at the age of 27. When the first retrospective exhibition was held at the famous Galerie Charpentier in Paris in January 1958, he was yet to reach 30 years old. On an opening day, nearly 10,000 people came to watch the exhibition from 4 pm to 8 pm. He quickly became the “most expensive painter in Europe” in the 1950s. He has regarded painting as his life for nearly fifty years. With the powerful and unique black line style, he has become the leader of French post-war expressionism.

Live in Seclusion, the World is Tranquil without Distractions: Environs de Cher

In the 1970s, when abstract painting styles were popular, Buffet always insisted on his figurative style, yet the outside world continued to criticize him. He bought Villiers-le-Mahieu, a century-old castle in the outskirts of Paris, and moved out of the noisy Paris with his family. During his 7 years of seclusion, Buffet finally found inner peace. At the same time, his painting style and subject matter also changed. He focused more on interpreting the geographical features he saw, awakening viewers' memories of the French Barbizon school and Pre-Impressionism, the pastoral poetic and artistic works. His peaceful painting also has the expressive strokes of Parisian Montmartre artists including Vlaminck Maurice de Vlaminck and Utrillo Maurice Utrillo, full of speed and power. In February 1974, Galerie Maurice Garnier in Paris held a solo exhibition Landscape. Art critics at the time were amazed by the gentle and peaceful style. Environs de Cher (Lot 105) is one of his outstanding landscape paintings of that period.

“I like the countryside, especially after I left from Paris for here, I start feeling the happiness of life.”
——Buffet

According to the inscription on the back of the painting, Environs de Cher completed in 1975 depicts the autumn scenery of holly oaks in the Château de Vieille-ville in the suburbs of Chers, France. The place near the residence of Buffet used to be a place for his daily strolls. The visual focus of the work starts from the lower right corner, extending along the pond to the center. The big white clouds in the blue sky reflect strong light in the water, which broadens the visual sense. It seems that the tall holly oak tree breaks through the limitations of the canvas, with the courage to test the height of the sky. Although the green leaves are all down, the branches are not declining at all. Through the artist's brushstrokes, the leaves are like carved into the canvas. The left and right sides of the dead branches are symmetrical, overlapping towards the sky, full of unquestionable authoritative images of the direction of his life. His brush strokes are quite similar to the calligraphy of Zhao Mengfu, the calligraphy master of the Yuan Dynasty. The painting style echoes the sharpness and unrestrained rhythm of the oriental wild grass calligraphy style, perfectly showing the spirit of the holly oak tree in autumn-“piercing through the clouds and pointing to the sky; the body is black yet will is strong.”
Besides, the background of the golden autumn forest is highly simplified. The roots of the branches are embellished with bright yellow colors, as if the dappled light and shadow of the setting sun are slanting, so that the picture exudes the soft tranquility and transparent calm that the earlier works did not have.

Take the Trifles as Lights as Clouds, See the Truth through the Luxury: The Clown

“The best thing you should do is not to think about God, but to uphold justice for yourself, because people refuse to give it to you.”
——Comte de Lautréamont, French poet

The classic black lines of Buffet and the spirit of oriental calligraphy go in the same way, which aroused the resonance and attention of Asian collectors. The loyal Japanese collector Kiichiro Okano established the world's first Buffet Art Museum in Shizuoka in 1973, amazingly exhibiting his collection of more than a thousand pieces of Buffet's works. In March of that year, Buffet was only 46 years old and was elected as a member of the French Academy of Fine Arts. France officially recognized his indelible artistic achievement and historical importance. Created in the Buffet's heyday, The Clown (Lot 106) combines the artist's iconic thick black lines and the clown theme that is most popular among collectors. The artist uses self-portraits as the prototype, and then incorporates the classic elements of the clown series. The white face is covered with powerfully portrayed black lines. The clown with curled eyebrows raises his forehead deeply. His thin flat lips are drooping with a decree pattern, and the eyes look like he is staring directly towards the viewers. It seems that he also looks into the distance with infinite sadness. Although he always keeps smiling, the feelings of helplessness are beyond words. Staring at the audience and looking at the distance with a thousand threads of sadness, he still smiles, yet and his helplessness is beyond words. Using geometric lines to portray the angular effects of published paintings, the painting conveys deep existential loneliness and sadness, which comes straight into the hearts of the people.

Price estimate:
HKD: 50,000 – 80,000
USD: 640 – 1,030

Auction Result:
HKD: 59,000