Raoul Dufy

Mme Raoul Dufy, Paris (acquired directly from the artist)
Private Collection, Paris
Jean Planque, Paris (acquired in 1956)
Mme Marguerite de la Chapelle, Paris (acquired circa 1958)
Hirschl & Adler, New York
Samuel J. & Ethel LeFrak, New York (acquired from the above in 1967)
Thence by descent

Paris, Salon des Indépendants, 1913, no. 928
Amsterdam, Galerie van Wisselingh, Mâitres français des XIXe XXe siècles, 1966, no. 7

Maurice Laffaille, Raoul Dufy, Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre peint de 1895-1915, vol. I, Geneva, 1972, no. 381, illustrated p. 315

The canvas is relined. There is fine craquelure throughout the composition, most notably in the paler background tones and to the green foliage in the upper left corner. When examined under UV light, there is retouching to the entire periphery of the canvas. There is an area of overpainting measuring approximately 3 by 3 in. in the lower right corner. There is repainting to the white pigments of the background, particularly in the lower left quadrant around the two female figures, and to the background above the two figures on the right. There is a further area of a number of lines of retouching to the lower left corner. The figures and horses appear to be free of any retouching. The pigments are fresh and strong and there is some strong impasto in places. The painting is in good condition.
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Painted in 1913, Promenade au bois is a wonderful example from the height of Raoul Dufy’s "Cézannesque" period. Like many of his contemporaries, Dufy looked to Cézanne for inspiration; “We have the tree, the bench, the house, but what interests me, the most difficult thing is what surrounds these objects. How do we hold everything together? Nobody has done it like Cézanne” (quoted in Dora Perez-Tibi, Raoul Dufy, New York, 1989, pp. 40-41).

Underlying this interest in the relationship between objects was an appreciation of the volumetric conception of space that Cézanne had imparted. The present work shows Dufy replicating these techniques; the tree trunk on the left and the simple planes of the houses stretching across the middle ground succeed in evoking a sense of volume operating in a compositional space, and the precise hatching of his brushwork creates an orderly, structured reality quite unlike the vibrant and chaotic compositions of his Fauvist period. His short, parallel brushstrokes lend a dynamic quality to the flat construction of geometrical forms, revealing his investigation of form and space in a brightly saturated, Cézanne-inspired variation of the cubist style that was closely related to, yet always distinct from mainstream Cubism.

Like many of his colleagues, Raoul Dufy had found inspiration for this new direction at the Cézanne retrospective at the 1907 Salon d'Automne and at Bernheim-Jeune at the same time. The following year, he joined Braque at L'Estaque, and the two painters rendered the local trees and hillsides in rigorously juxtaposed, simplified planes. Dufy was relatively selective in his adoption of a Cubist aesthetic, as discussed by Dora Perez-Tibi: "While Braque, like Picasso, was to take his experiments further, towards an almost hermetic analysis of forms—conveying their internal structures in an explosion of facets on the surface of the canvas, the source of the cubist aesthetic—Dufy would go on to rediscover the spirit of the older painter's method, and intensify his experiments with the expressive possibilities of space that Cézanne's aesthetic offered to him" (in Dora Perez-Tibi, Raoul Dufy, London, 1989, p. 37).

The strong lines and colors of the present painting also reflect Dufy's preoccupation with woodcuts and textile design. A trip to Munich in 1909 led to the artist's discovery of Expressionism and the possibilities of wood-engraving. The constructive brush strokes that characterize his work from this period, the present painting included, mirror his work with a penknife and gouge in relief engravings on wood. It is evident that the specificities of this printing technique offered opportunities to explore new ideas on the interpenetration of planes. Dufy went on to create a number of woodcut illustrations for poets and writers, including his friend Guillaume Apollinaire.

Having become engrossed in Medieval woodcut techniques three years prior, Dufy began printing his woodcuts on dress fabrics in 1910. This bold move attracted the interest of the fashion designer Paul Poiret, who set him up in a studio in Montmartre and gave him free rein to develop new patterns. This is particularly interesting given the jaunty plaid pattern the artist articulates in the dress of the standing female figure on the left. Her fashionable attire is in contrast to the sober one of the woman on horseback behind her and hints at the subject matter of the painting.

While the title and composition are formally elegant and seemingly innocent, the Bois de Boulogne was at the time a well-known salacious haunt on the edges of Paris and the figure on the left is most likely a prostitute soliciting the well-to-do gentlemen on the right, while a stern female figure looks down on her, both physically and metaphorically.