MARIUS MICHEL (b. Sète, France 1853)
Peinture Religieuse (or The Jewish Paintress)
signed and dated Marius Michel 1882 in the lower right
oil on canvas
49 ¾ x 31 ½ inches (127 x 80.5 cm.)
PROVENANCE
Anonymous sale, Sotheby’s, New York, January 26, 1979, lot 190 (as The Artist’s Studio, wrongly dated 1892)
Private Collection, Sarasota, Florida
EXHIBITED
Paris, Salon, 1882, no. 1883
LITERATURE
Explication des Ouvrages De Peintre, Sculpture, Architecture, Gravure et Lithographie des Artistes Vivants Exposés au Palais des Champs-Elysées, Charles de Mourgues Frères, Paris, May 1, 1882, p. 163, no. 1883
“La Peintre de Genre” in L’Exposition des Beaux-Arts (Salon de 1882), Goupil et Cie, Librairie D’Art, Paris, 1882, p. 69, illustrated
F. G. Dumas, Catalogue Illustré du Salon, L. Baschet, Libraire D’Art, Paris, 1882, p. XLIX, no. 1883
Le Monde Illustré, June 20, 1883, p. 248, illustrated
Pierre Sanchez and Xavier Seydoux, “Salon de 1882” in Les Catalogues des Salons des Beaux – Arts, volume 13, L’Echelle de Jacob, Dijon, c. 1999 – 2014, p. 163
ENGRAVED
Jules - Louis – Laurent Longeval, 1883
When Marius Michel’s Peinture Religieuse was reviewed in Goupil’s L’Exposition des Beaux-Arts published for the 1882 Salon, an unnamed reviewer took the very odd approach of belittling the portrayed female painter. He began by questioning what country is she from? He continued by mocking the apparent diligence she has applied to her task, concluding that no matter how hard she works painters such as Velazquez need not worry. He does not attack Michel or the actual painting, only the imaginary woman.[1] Such a review demonstrates two of the prevailing prejudices of the period, a very strong anti – immigrant sentiment and the overriding belief that the creation of serious art was strictly a male profession. And in all likelihood the provoking of such a review was Michel’s intent.
In Michel’s painting, set in a shabby room, a seated young woman in black paints a porcelain figure of the Virgin and Child. A finished St. Francis of Assisi is on the floor. Other projects line the walls, along with a few props, and some small, framed works. On the stool in front of her is an almost empty glass of absinthe with a half-full bottle on the floor. At the edge of the right side of the table is a German beer stein, holding an assortment of brushes, decorated with a partly visible brewer’s star, a symbol identical to the Jewish Star of David. Michel painted this during a period of rabid antisemitism and surging hatred of foreigners ignited by the crash of the Paris Bourse in January 1882 for which Jewish banks were wrongly blamed.[2] By the facile use of a single partially obscured object, the painter triggered thoughts of his subject as possibly being Jewish as well as foreign.
As the painting further attests, Michel was certainly aware of the hardships female artists endured. His own instructor Carolus–Duran had run a studio for women since 1874, as they were not allowed entrance to the École des Beaux-Arts. Women were also ineligible for the Prix de Rome, medals, official commissions, the Légion d’Honneur and the Institute of France. With men as well in control of the press and art market, the chance for a successful career by a woman in the arts was extremely slim.[3] Instead they were steered towards the painting of porcelain. The prevailing male view was that women were “somehow biologically fit for making domestic wares” being more “dexterous, delicate, and meticulous”. Further it was felt that their retiring and modest nature “made them particularly well suited for the semi –skilled repetitive work”.[4] Michel succinctly captured this dilemma, depicting a woman caught in a downward spiral, emblemized by the absinthe which was regarded as a destroyer of life. While creating a potential target of derision, Michel by means of a beautifully painted canvas with exquisite details presents a sympathetic rendering of a unique subject.
Very little has been written about Marius Michel. His subject matter included genre, landscapes, still lifes and architectural views. He was a student of Carolus-Duran and André Wilder. He exhibited at the Paris Salon from 1879 – 1907 where he received several awards and his paintings were acquired by museums in Sète and Nantes.[5]
The importance of exhibiting at the Salon in Paris at this time cannot be overstated. The Salon set the standards for the art market not only in France but throughout the entire Western world, and from 1848 – 1898 it was at the peak of its power. Thousands of paintings were hung at each Salon, creating the largest exhibition of contemporary art in the world. Thousands poured into Paris to attend the Salon, with years that had 500,000 visitors not unusual. The public regarded the painters whose work had been accepted by the Salon to be worthy of purchase, with the exact opposite being true for those whose paintings had been rejected.[6] Undoubtedly an artist’s submission to the Salon was agonized over, with only his best work sent, as each time the future success of his career was at stake. The other problem was how to insure one’s painting stood out in a virtual sea of works. We know in a number of paintings Michel did this with shocking subject matter.
His Salon entry of 1880 titled L ’Absinthe was of a demimonde smoking and drinking. In 1883 he exhibited the painting La Photographie de la Momie (The Photograph of a Mummy) that depicted Emile Brugsch the conservator of the Boulaq Museum, Cairo photographing an almost completely unwrapped mummy with other open sarcophagi strewn about.[7] Another work titled L’Embaumeur (The Embalmer) presumably was as equally disquieting; with probably the most disturbing being The Montmartre Murder done for a party given by Guy de Maupassant which featured a real knife and actual blood.[8] At first glance Peinture Religieuse appears quite tame in comparison to these works, but in a far more subtle way it was intended to be just as or even more disturbing. In the context of the moment, the work’s juxtaposition of religious symbols is quite startling, and his subject engaged in the painting of religious statuary almost sacrilegious. Yet while potentially provoking the hostility of his viewers, Michel strove to demonstrate their hatred and mistrust to be misplaced.
We are indebted to Dr. Sanford M. Jacoby, Distinguished Research Professor of the University of California, Los Angeles for his invaluable help in writing this entry.
[1] See “La Peinture de Genre”, L’Exposition des Beaux-Arts, op.cit., p. 69.
[2] David Glasner, Thomas F. Cooley, “Depression of 1882 – 1885” in Business Cycles and Depressions: An Encyclopedia, Taylor & Francis, 1997; Vinay Swamy, Interpreting the Republic, Marginalization and Belonging in Contemporary Novels and Films, Lexington Books, Lanham, MD, 2011, p. 2; and James McAuley, The House of Fragile Things, Yale University Press, New Haven & London, 2021, pp. 54-55.
[3] Laurence Madeline, “Into the Light”, pp. 16, 26-27, and Richard Kendall, “Women Artists in A Man’s World”, p. 48 in Women Artists in Paris 1850 - 1900, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2017.
[4] Pamela Simpson, “Review Potters and Paintresses: Women Designers in the Pottery Industry 1870 – 1955” in Women’s Art Inc., volume 13, no. 2, p. 47; and Dr. Ilya Sandra Perlingieri, “Paintresses: Victorian Women China Painters and Potters” on www.antiquesjournal.com., p. 3.
[5] Biographical information taken from E. Bénézit, “Marius Michel” in Dictionnaire des Peintres, Sculptures, Dessinateurs et Graveurs, volume 7, Libraire Gründ, Paris, 1976, p. 388; and “Marius Michel” on rkd.nl (RKD Explore) website.
[6] Gerald M. Ackerman, “The Glory and the Decline of a Great Institution” in French Salon Paintings from Southern Collections, The High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia, January 21 – March 3, 1983, pp. 8, 9, 12.
[7] Jonathon Elias, “Emile Brugsch” in Mummies Around the World, ABC-CLID, Santa Barbara, CA, 2015, pp. 42 – 44.
[8] Francois Teasart, Recollections of Guy de Maupassant, John Lane Company, New York, 1912, pp. 213 – 214.