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Presentation: Framed
SN: 4537
Oil on Panel
10 x14 in. (25.3 x 35.5 cm)Although born in Wales, he was the son of the Marquis de Belleroche, of one of the most ancient French noble families who, being Huguenots, had fled to England in 1685. In 1871, following the death of his father, he moved back to Paris with his family. After he had finished school there, he studied at the studio of Carolus Duran, and spent long hours copying at the Paris museums. He soon became familiar with the leading painters and intellectuals of the day, and became a founder member of the Salon d'Automne, exhibiting alongside the Impressionists and associating with Emile Zola, Oscar Wilde, Albert Moore, Renoir, Degas, Helleu and Toulouse-Lautrec. Toulouse-Lautrec and Belleroche were exact contemporaries, who first met at the age of eighteen. Belleroche painted Toulouse-Lautrec's portrait and shared with him a passion for the model Lili, who epitomised the Belle Epoch aesthetic of Toulouse-Lautrec's most celebrated posters. Lili became Belleroche's favourite model and mistress. In 1882 Belleroche also met the already acclaimed American painter John Singer Sargent, who recognised Belleroche's talent and empathised with his free drawing style and sensitivity to light. They became life-long friends. Sargent's handling of pastel was a great inspiration to Belleroche, while Belleroche's sensitivity to tone and creation of form through the modeling of light exerted a strong influence on Sargent. In 1900, Belleroche became fascinated by the medium of lithography and by 1905 he was a leading figure in the field of lithographic portraiture. A.M. Hind, a former keeper of prints at the British Museum, described his works in lithography as "amongst the greatest achievements of the craft since its discovery."
He held commercial exhibitions at the Goupil Gallery (1903), Graves, London (1906), Colnaghi's (1941) and Walker Gallery, London (1942). As however he had no need to live from his art, he rarely took on commissioned portraits, instead choosing models and sitters who interested him. This in part - though not entirely - explains why he is so little known. A room in the Musée D'Orange is dedicated to Belleroche. He was the subject of numerous publications during his lifetime, and in 2001 the San Diego Museum of Art organised an exhibition and produced a catalogue entitled The Rival of Painting: the Lithographs of Albert Belleroche.
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Presentation: Unmounted
SN: 5194Pencil, charcoal and brown chalk
16 3/4 x 11 in. (42.5 x 28 cm)
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 189
Oil on canvas, 1880's
signed on reverse
24 x 18 1/2 ins. (61 x 47 cms).
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 190
Oil on canvas,
signed on reverse, canvas stamped Paul Foinet
24 x 20 ins. (61 x 50.8 cms).
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 193
Oil on canvas
11 3/4 x 16 in [30 x 40.4 cm]
Provenance: the artist's studio; William de Belleroche; private collection
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 196
Lithographic crayon on a postcard
3 1/4 x 5 1/2 in [14 x 8.5 cm]
Provenance: the artist's studio; William de Belleroche; private collection
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 197
Pencil
4 x 5 1/4 in [10 x 13 cm]
Provenance: the artist's studio; William de Belleroche; private collection
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 200
Pencil
Each 6 1/4 x 4 5/8 in [16 x 11.5 cm]
Provenance: the artist's studio; William de Belleroche; private collection
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 205
Lithographic Crayon
Signed, Belleroche and with initials, inscribed with title
17 1/2 x 22 1/2 in [44.5 x 57.2 cm]
Provenance: the artist's studio; William de Belleroche; private collection
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 316
Signed in pencil
oil on canvas
21 x 26 1/4 in. (53.2 x 66.5 cm.)
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 365
Signed on reverse
oil on canvas (P. Aprin, Paris)
19 x 15 1/2 in. (48.2 x 39.5 cm.)
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 369
Signed in pencil
Oil on canvas
30 x 21 1/2 in. (76.3 x 54.5 cm.)
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 438
Oil on canvas,
11 1/2 x 12 1/4 in. (29.3 x 31 cm.)
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 592
Signed, number 170 on the reverse;
pencil,14 1/2 × 10 1/4 in. (36.7 × 26 cm.)
Provenance: the artistí's studio; William de Belleroche; private collection
'While his works are diverse ... they celebrate foremost the womanhood of our time ... These are thoroughly modern works which capture brief, reverent moments of joy, tenderness and wonder, much like the works of Sargent, Helleu or Besnard.Belleroche's portraits of woman are iconographic' (Claude Roger-Marx, 'Peintres-lithographes Contemporains: Albert Belleroche', Gazette des Beaux-Arts I, vol.39, 1908,p.74).
Along with Paul Helleu, Belleroche produced some of the most evocative images of belle-Èpoque women of his generation. Although Belleroche made a number of lithographs of women with turbans or toques around this period, none are known to relate specifically to this study.
We are grateful to Gordon Anderson for assistance.
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 598
Signed with initials
Oil on canvas
21 1/2 x 18 in. (54.5 x 45.8 cm)
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 599
Oil on prepared millboard (Winsor and Newton)
8 x 10 in. (20.3 x 25.5 cm.)
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 2657
Signed, oil on canvas17 1/8 x 16 3/4 in. (43.5 x 42.5 cm)
Provenance: Julie de Belleroche; William de Belleroche, Ruth Wittman
The room represented in his painting is almost certainly the dining-room belonging to the artist, John Singer Sargent (1856-1925), at 33 Tite Street, Chelsea, London. Sargent painted an almost identical view of the room, called 'My Dining-Room', which is now at Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Massachusetts.
Both paintings date
from c.1886-9. Sargent moved into the ground-floor studio at 33 Tite
Street in 1886, later acquiring the house next door, 31, and knocking a
hole through the wall to unite them. The proportions of the room in 33
Tite Street, which was then Sargent's dining-room, and which survives
today, match those of the room represented in the paintings. The blue
bowl on the sideboard, which features in both works, is still owned by
descendants of Sargent's sister, Violet. A second picture by Sargent
called 'The Blue Bowl', showing this object, seems to be a view of the
dining-room looking the other way (Addison Gallery of American Art,
Amherst, Massachusetts). Sargent and Belleroche had been close friends
since their student days in Paris, and are known to have shared a
studio from time to time, so there is nothing improbable in their
sitting side by side to paint the same scene. The two little
girls poring over a sketch in Belleroche's picture, who add to it a
warm, human note, have not been identified, probably the daughters of a
friend.The Belleroche painting is reproduced in the 5th volume of the Sargent catalogue raisonne: Richard Ormond and Elaine Kilmurray, 'John Singer Sargent: Figures and Landscapes, 1883-1899', Yale University Press, New Haven & London, 2010, p. 92.'We are grateful to Richard Ormond for assistance.
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 2658
Oil on canvas
18 5/16 x 15 3/16 in. (46.5 x 38.5 cm.)
Provenance: with Arthur Tooth and Sons Ltd, London
Exhibited Arthur Tooth & Sons LTD, Albert de Belleroche Early Pintings, January 13th . February 5th 1955, Number 6
"His still-life pictures - with the glimmer of light on silver and other objects, the shadows full of rich and reflected tones - has bough a new note into this kind of painting. One might say that he had carried the tradition of Chardin a step further, giving immediacy to his effects of light and colour, crystallizing the emotion of a particular moment. In this work one feels that, with his lively and nervous handling of paint, he makes the objects before him live in the moving light that plays on them, and it is not surprising that Degas though so highly of these works." Frank Brangwyn, Foreword to Albert de Belleroche by Julian A Millest, Apollo, 1935, XXI 124 April
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 2659
Inscribed on the reverse
Oil on rathbone prepared artist panel
16 x 23.5 cm
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 2662
Inscribed on the reverse
Oil on canvas
56 x 44.5 cm
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 2663
Inscribed with inventory number 230
Oil on board
55.5 x 41.5 cm
Belleroche produced a lithograph titled La Boissiere (Interior) in 1909.
This shows a view, from the interior, looking through the same doorway to the courtyard of la Boissiere with a woman seated at work.
La Boissiere was an inn near Chateaudun where Belleroche stayed when he painted in the countryside.
There is a painting of mother and child on the reverse.
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 2664
Signed in pencil
Oil on canvas
54 x 41.5 cm
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 2666
Signed
Oil on canvas
46.5 x 38.5 cm
Provenance: with Arthur Tooth and Sons Ltd, London
Exhibited: Paris Salon, 1889; Arthur Tooth & Sons LTD, Albert de Belleroche Early Pintings, January 13th . February 5th 1955, Number 26
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 2667
Signed on the reverse
Oil on canvas (stamped Paul Foinet)
51 x 41 cm
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Presentation: Unmounted
SN: 2949
Lithograph in black ink on light brown paper
Proof, inscribed Julie with inventory reference 334
16 x 11 1/2 in. (40.7 x 29.2 cm)
Provenance: from the personal collection of William de Belleroche.
The model for La Toilette is Julie Visseaux. Belleroche married her in 1910, when he was 45 and Julie 17 years his junior. Julie was the daughter of Belleroche's friend the sculptor Jules Edouard Visseaux.
Belleroche was a founder member of the Salon d'Automne, exhibiting alongside the Impressionists and associating with Emile Zola, Oscar Wilde, Albert Moore, Renoir, Degas, Helleu and Toulouse-Lautrec. He shared a studio with his friend, John Singer Sargent, whose handling of pastel was to be of great inspiration to Belleroche. In turn, Belleroche's sensitivity to tone and creation of form through the modelling of light exerted an influence on Sargent. Belleroche's talent as a painter was recognized by his contemporaries - Degas owned three lithographs by Belleroche and in the early 1890s the French state acquired a painting for the Luxembourg Gallery. Roger-Marx, the critic who discovered Renoir, was amongst Belleroche's fervent admirers, referring to him as 'le peintre des femmes decoiffées' (Gazette de Beaux-Arts, XLX, Jan 1905).
Marx also fully acknowledged Belleroche's importance as painter-lithographer, writing in 1908: Belleroche holds a premier position in the current renaissance of lithography. No one since Eugene Carriere has equaled Belleroche's technique or his understanding of lithography. He is a master.... Indeed he is a painter-lithographer: he brings his subjects to life in moving light and shwadows. His ink creates tones which reach the limits of the joyous and profound... His art, born in a daylight which is its own jstification, is created from love." (Claude Roger-Marx, Peintres-lithographes Contemporains:Albert Belleroche" Gazette des Beaux-Arts I, vol 39, 1908, p. 74.
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 10
Signed on front with monogram, and numbered on reverse 18, lithographic crayon, 10¾ x 7¾ ins. (27.5 x 20 cms.)
Literature: Kern Steven, The Rival of Painting: the Lithographs of Albert Belleroche, San Diego Museum of Art, 2001
His works in lithography are amongst the greatest achievements of the craft since its discovery, A.M. Hind, Keeper of Prints at the British Museum, 1943.
This drawing is a preparatory work for a lithograph. Hugely admired by his contemporaries for his free drawing style and sensitivity to light, after 1900 Belleroche became a leading figure in portrait lithographs. Belleroche exhibited alongside the celebrated Impressionists and associated closely with the leading intellectuals and painters of the day such as Sargent, Toulouse-Lautrec, Zola, Oscar Wilde and Degas.
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 11
Inscribed 106; lithographic crayon on laid paper, 6Q X 7A ins. (16.5 X 18 cms.)
Provenance: Count William de Belleroche; private collection
Belleroche was a founder member of the Salon d'Automne, exhibiting alongside the Impressionists and associating with Emile Zola, Oscar Wilde, Albert Moore, Renoir, Degas, Helleu and Toulouse-Lautrec. He shared a studio with his friend, John Singer Sargent, whose handling of pastel was to be of great inspiration to Belleroche. In turn, Belleroche's sensitivity to tone and creation of form through the modelling of light exerted an influence on Sargent. Belleroche's talent as a painter was recognized by his contemporaries - Degas purchased a work from him and in the early 1890s the French state acquired a painting for the Luxembourg Gallery. Roger-Marx, the critic who discovered Renoir, was amongst Belleroche's fervent admirers, referring to him as 'le peintre des femmes decoiffées' (Gazette de Beaux-Arts, XLX, Jan 1905).
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Presentation: Framed
SN: 2589
Inscribed ‘Programme, Saturday, July 19, 1919’
Lithographic crayon with sanguine highlights
22 × 14 in. (56 × 35.5 cm)
Throughout the Summer of 1919, following the signing of theTreaty of Versailles (28 June 1919) Peace Celebrations took place across Britain, usually organised by local Parish Councils with programmes of thanksgiving, parades, games and dancing.
Belleroche lived in Rustington from 1918, having restored the Manor House which he first acquired in 1914.TheVignette shows Rustington Church upon which the celebrations centred.
This drawing comes from a relatively late period in the artist's oeuvre when he was no longer seeking public recognition, (no Belleroche exhibitions took place between 1914 and 1933).The drawing, however , calls upon Belleroche's earlier work when he was more in the public eye, exhibiting alongside the Impressionists and John Singer Sargent with whom he associated in Paris during the Belle Epoch.
