Jean Béraud

Sale: Hôtel Drouot, Paris, June 19, 1989, lot 53
Private Collection, France

Paris, Salon, 1899, no. 120

Gustave Coquiot, "La vie artistique. Les Salons de mai," La Vogue, May 1899, p. 124
Furetières, "La Salon de 1899, Société nationale des beaux arts," Le Soleil, May-June 1899, p. 2
Octave Uzanne, "Les Salons du Champ-de-Mars. Société nationale des beaux-arts," L'Écho de Paris, May 1, 1899
E. Jungle, "Le Salon de 1899. à la Société nationale des beaux arts," La Nation, May 2, 1899, p. 2
H. Renard, "Le Salon," Le Voltaire, May 24, 1899, p. 2
Auguste Dalligny, "Les Salons de 1899.  Société nationale des beaux-arts," Le Journal des arts, June 24, 1899
Patrick Offenstadt, Jean Béraud, 1849-1935, The Belle Époque, A Dream of Times Gone By, catalogue raisonné, Cologne, 1999, p. 100, no. 27, illustrated (as Grands Boulevards. Porte Saint-Denis)

The following condition report was kindly provided by Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc.: This painting has been quite recently restored. The canvas is unlined. The paint layer is clean. There are a few tiny retouches in a couple of the figures in the center of the composition. A couple of horizontal lines in the lower center of the sky have been retouched. This is a very delicate paint layer which is still in beautiful 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."

Le boulevard Saint-Denis à Paris depicts a typical, busy Parisian street at the end of the nineteenth century. In the background, set against the hustle and bustle of the modern boulevards of Baron Haussman, stands the Porte Saint-Denis which was one of two triumphal arches commissioned by Louis XIV to commemorate his military victories. The Saint-Denis arch was erected between 1671 and 1674 and inspired the design of the more famous Arc de Triomphe. In Béraud's composition the view looks East from the end of boulevard Bonne-Nouvelle down boulevard Saint Denis.

The wide streets and tree lined boulevards of Hausmann's Paris feature prominently in Béraud's work. Like the celebrated Impressionist Gustave Caillebotte, Béraud revealed himself as a painter of modern life conveying the many pleasures that the new city offered to Parisians. Described by a critic as "a sophisticated Parisian who knows where to go and has the gift for observation" (Saint-Juirs, "Le Salon de 1881," Le Clairon, May 1, 1881, p. 2 as quoted in Offenstadt, p. 49). Béraud drew his subjects from all aspects of city life observing the "beau monde" as they paraded through the streets of Paris mingling with the shop girls, delivery boys and tradesmen, his lively brushstrokes capturing this animated scene for posterity.