Adrien Moreau

M. Bulla (by 1879)
Sale: Christie's, London, 12 July 1968, lot 46
Sale: Christie's, London, 21 November 1996, lot 185
MacConnal-Mason, London
Purchased from the above by the present owner in 1997

Paris, Salon, 1879, no. 2178

Emile Bellier de la Chavignerie and Louis Auvray, Dictionnaire général des artistes de l'école française, Paris, 1885, vol. II, p. 120, cited

The canvas has been relined. There are extremely faint vertical lines across the surface, likely attributable to the canvas being taken off of its stretcher at one point. Under ultraviolet light there are signs of retouching addressing fine craquelure associated with these lines, and a small spot in the column above the flautists. The appearance of this work is good and it is clean and ready to hang.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Les Noces d'Argent depicts the joyous celebration of a wealthy couple's silver wedding anniversary during the seventeenth century. Wearing the sumptuous bourgeois dress of the day, the celebrating couple step out into a courtyard and are greeted by well-wishers, from the old gentleman raising a glass at the table (possibly a father of one of the couple), to the musicians seated at the bench, or the maid smiling from the window. Moreau fills the scene with richly painted details to delight the eye, in a work which looks back to the Dutch seventeenth-century genre painters, chief among them Gabriël Metsu (1629-1667). The revival of this style in the nineteenth century was led by Jean-Ernest Meissonier, whose paintings were enormously popular among the newly wealthy European and American bourgeois of his day, commanding extremely high prices. 

A pupil of Isidore Pils at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, Adrien Moreau exhibited at the Paris Salon for the first time in 1868. He was awarded a second-class medal at the Salon of 1876, silver in 1899 and at the Exposition Universelle of 1900, and was made Chévalier de la Légion d'honneur in 1892. As well as painting popular historical genre scenes of which the present work is a prime example, he also produced book illustrations, notably those for an edition of Candide by Voltaire in 1893.