Jean Béraud

Private Collection, New York (before 1996)
Sale: William Doyle Galleries, New York, November 6, 1996, lot 13, illustrated
Jean-François Heim, Paris
Acquired from the above by the present owner

Paris, Musée Carnavalet, Jean Béraud et le Paris de la Belle Époque, September 29, 1999-January 2, 2000, no. 21

Patrick Offenstadt, Jean Béraud, 1849-1935, The Belle Époque: A Dream of Times Gone By, catalogue raisonné, Cologne, 1999, p. 177, no. 193, illustrated p. 176

The following condition report was kindly provided by Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc.: This painting has an old European lining. The paint layer is clean and varnished. There is what appears to be a small break in the paint layer located in the gray, framed artwork on the wall in the center of the work. There is another break below this same framed work, and a third to the left of it, on the red wall. If there are any restorations to these three areas, only the one in the red wall is visible under ultraviolet light. Numerous cracks and possible thinness that has been retouched are visible under ultraviolet light in the black suits of the figures congregated in the center and on the right side. Elsewhere, however there is no restoration visible either under ultraviolet light examination or when viewed with the naked eye. The condition is good despite these few retouches and the painting should be hung in its current state.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

Throughout the Belle Époque, Jean Béraud moved through Paris’ fashionable set with a calendar so full he once remarked wearily: “I go out a lot, too much, even” (as quoted in Offenstadt, p. 18).  Through countless engagements, Béraud turned his keen eye toward the subtle social codes and nuanced manners of Paris’ elite gatherings, recording them in compositions like La Réception.  While works like Une soirée (1878, Musée d’Orsay Paris),  depict a frieze-like arrangement of dancers gathering on a glossy ballroom floor, in the present work Béraud retreats to a petit salon, the gathering place for men to chat away from the bustle of the party and the company of women.  The sartorial display in the present work is a relatively rare glimpse of such men’s fashion of the era. 

Indeed, in the catalogue for the recent exhibition, Impressionism, Fashion and Modernity, Philippe Thiébaut and Gloria Groom discuss just how infrequently Béraud’s contemporaries, the Impressionists, painted men's black-and-white evening costume, perhaps due to its static appearance.  In the late nineteenth century, the Parisian man was limited to two changes of clothes: from daytime to evening outfits, with an overall emphasis on dark colors (Philippe Thiébaut, “An Ideal of Virile Urbanity,” p. 137, 142; Gloria Groom, “Spaces of Modernity,” p. 183 in Impressionism, Fashion, Modernity, exh. cat., The Art Institute of Chicago, The Metropolitan Museum, New York, Musée d’Orsay, Paris, 2012).  When considering the proper dress for men, an 1870s Paris guidebook noted while “all of coquetry’s light is on Woman,” [sic] man is “the lining of the jewelry box against which the eternal diamond stands out…. He allows her to sing the symphony of white, pink, and green, as a solo” (Guide sentimental de l’étranger dans Paris, pp. 83-4 as quoted in Thiébaut, p. 137).  Fittingly, in the present work, pops of bright color come from the floral hues of the women’s gowns as they stand in a receiving line. The uniformity of men’s costume demanded that artists like Béraud use gesture or pose to suggest individual personality: hands clad in white gloves punctuate a conversation, while a slouched shoulder suggests a fatigue with the topic at hand (Thiébaut p. 140). The men are on unselfconscious display just as they are in the series of works Béraud painted of male-only private clubs.  Given contemporary fashion’s challenges for the artist, the wit and charm of La Réception is a particular testament to Béraud’s skill.