Romanticism and Classicism

Romanticism
and Classicism
...
The son of a partner at the Tissié-Sarrus bank, Alfred Bruyas (1821-1877) did not follow in
his father’s footsteps but devoted himself to art from his schooldays at Lorrèze in the Tarn
department of Southwest France. Studying under the painter Charles Matet (1791-1870) at
the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Montpellier, he soon realised the limits of his talents and
decided to use his fortune to fulfil his artistic aspirations. He started to build up a collection
from among the painters he found in his entourage ; Auguste Barthélemy Glaize (1807-1893)
of Montpellier, a self-taught artist who made his career at the Paris Salon, would be his most
loyal ally, providing Bruyas with his first and last portrait (Portrait of Bruyas*, 1846 ; Portrait
of Bruyas as an Old Man*, 1876).
The Bruyas
Gallery
...
Achille and Eugène Devéria (1805-1865), whom he met while taking the waters in the
Pyrenees and who were working in the Midi, introduced him to the Romantic movement. And
Alexandre Cabanel (1823-1889), a fellow student at Montpellier, would receive him at the
Villa Medici during two formative trips in 1846 and 1848.
Bruyas soon made a name for himself among his fellow citizens with his taste for
portraiture that would lead him to pose over thirty times for the most famous painters of
his age. His was a dazzling, cosmopolitan existence, which Glaize was commissioned to record
for posterity. In 1848, the appearance of Glaize’s Interior of Bruyas’s Study unveiled a still
faltering collection, but one which was already rousing curiosity. Alongside his father,
Bruyas senior, and friends, Bricogne, Bimar and Tissié, the young Alfred Bruyas posed before
his acquisitions wearing a smoking jacket.
Romanticism
and Classicism
...
English translation by Susan Schneider
31
In 1851, it was also Glaize who provided the patron’s official portrait, styled as patron
of the arts and Italy, the latter personified by a youth crowned with a laurel wreath, in the
Portrait of Alfred Bruyas, aka The Burnoose*. At that time, Alfred Bruyas liked to use the phrase
the “new Medici” after his signature, as further proof of his artistic aspirations. Yet this carefree
existence, last glimpsed in Glaize’s Olim or Souvenir of the Pyrenees*, was to end when Bruyas
moved to Paris in the autumn of 1849. At the forefront of artistic debates, he was now to
set himself a higher calling which would take over completely – to uphold anything that would
help to restore truth and beauty in the art of his time. This was a fundamental stage in the
reconciliation of a society divided and undermined by political crisis and growing
impoverishment.
One school – that of the Barbizon and Forest of
Fontainebleau painters – embodied the renewed interest
in the landscape genre, professing to depict authentic rural
French landscapes, far removed from the studied landscapes
of the classical tradition. Within a few years, Bruyas was
to acquire masterpieces by Corot (1796-1875) (Fishing with
Nets*, Morning*) ; by Rousseau (1812-1867) (The Pond*) ;
and by Huet (1803-1869) (Hunter in the Forest of
Fontainebleau*). He met Thomas Couture* (1815-1879),
a real celebrity since the triumphant success of his Romans
of the Decadence at the 1847 Salon (Paris, Musée d’Orsay),
who was to paint his portrait on two occasions. Bruyas
enlisted the services of painter Octave Tassaert (18001874) from whom he purchased seventeen works. As well as his XX portraits – the delightful
Bruyas at home* which is part of a series depicting the collector among his pictures –
Bruyas is apparently also present in disguise in Christians in the Catacombs*. Emboldened
by these connections, the young collector turned to the grands maîtres and made a name
for himself in Parisian circles by the masterly purchase of Women of Algiers* and Moroccan
*
An asterisk indicates that the work mentionned is displayed in the room
fig.1- Photograph
of Alfred Bruyas by Huguet-Molines
Military Exercises* (Room 32) by Delacroix, who
would also paint his portrait.
The same year, his meeting with Courbet (18191877) at the 1853 Salon, was to mark a peak in
Bruyas’s career as a collector. However, his time in
Paris was also marked by sadness, particularly in
matters of the heart. Marcel Verdier*, a pupil of
Ingres, gives us two images of a Parisian lady –
probably the collector’s mistress – which set her at
the centre of a strange composition Life’s Dream that
epitomizes his aspirations and suffering (fig.2). If
the selfsame painter also takes the liberty of
portraying Bruyas as Christ Crowned with Thorns*,
it is because Bruyas expressly requested this – in
his writings, Bruyas often uses rhetorical
expressions of sacrifice, seeing himself as a martyr, sacrificing his private life, his fortune
and (delicate) health to the cause of art.
fig.2- J.P. Laurens
Life’s Dream
Lithograph after a montage by
Alfred Bruyas, works by Tassaert
and Verdier with photographs
The annual publication of his gallery’s catalogue from 1851 to 1854, featuring aesthetic
and philosophical reflections, poems and friendly words, was an interesting feature that was
to do him a disservice with his contemporaries – in 1857 the writer Champfleury, an advocate
of Realism in literature (cf. his realistic romance Chien-Caillou) and in painting (Courbet)
published a short story gibing at the egotic habits of an enigmatic and outlandish provincial
collector. Recognizing himself in figure of “Monsieur T”, Bruyas was deeply hurt. He went
back to Montpellier and abandoned the idea of taking his collection to Paris.
For ten years he would work at regaining his good name by supporting local art-related
initiatives – he chaired the Beaux Arts 1860 exhibition selection committee in Montpellier,
and loaned his collection on several occasions to Toulouse
and Lyon. Yet he was careful to withhold those paintings
– his portraits and works by Courbet – whose scandalous
reputation had been so detrimental to him. Following the
death of his father in 1863, Alfred Bruyas seemed set to
take his future in hand. He made official his relationship
with Berthe Anton, the mother of his daughter, and
above all he decided to donate his collection to the city
of Montpellier, an offer gladly accepted in 1868.
Appointed curator at his “museum” within the
museum and awarded the Legion of Honour at the request
of Mayor Jules Pagézy (Glaize’s Portrait of Bruyas as an
Old Man*), Bruyas devoted his remaining energy to
filling the gaps in his “gallery” to make it into a collection representative of the art of his
time. He thus purchased some of the finest masterpieces of his collection – Study of a
Severed Arm and Legs* (Room 32) by Géricault (1798-1863) ; Delacroix’s Portrait of Aspasie*
(Room 32) ; or two studies by Ingres (1780-1867) Jesus among the Doctors* and the
Apotheosis of Homer* (both in Room 33).
With his passion for the work of animal sculptor Barye (1796-1875), over a few years Bruyas
purchased no less than seventeen of the artist’s bronzes and three watercolours, which he
placed in his study as shown in the painting by Edouard Marsal* (1845-1929). He passed away
on 1st January 1877 aged fifty-five, sapped by the tuberculosis that had plagued him since
childhood and leaving unfinished his gallery’s catalogue which he was working on together
with art critic Théophile Silvestre. His will stated that everything in the museum at the time
of his death should go to the city of Montpellier – a second sizeable donation that would
come to enrich the collections of the Musée Fabre.
fig.3- Photographs of
Alfred Bruyas by Huguet-Molines