Reference: Paris auction- 24 works by Bessie Davidson. 24 Bessie Davidson works to be sold 10/10/2014
Drouot-richelieu
9, rue Drouot
75009 Paris
PARIS
FRANCE
Auctioneer:
Beaussant-Lefevre SARL
NB – The collection is from Mary Margaret Gard-d'Authier Rochefort and Conrad Kickert are mentioned extensively in ‘A Studio in Montparnasse - Bessie Davidson: An Australian Artist in Paris’, by Penelope Little, Craftsman House, 2003, hc, dw, 223pp with index. Catalogue notes: ‘Bessie Davidson in 1949 between Mary Margaret Gard-d'Authier Rochefort and Conrad Kickert. Of Scottish origin, born in Australia, Bessie Davidson saw an Australian childhood and received until 1904 trained as a painter with his teacher Margaret Preston. At the age of 24, she moved with her to Europe to study art. She first spent a few months in Munich, where she studied at the Künstlerinner Verein, before settling in Paris. In Montparnasse, she attended the Atelier de la Grande Chaumiere and became a student of René Xavier Prinet. It fits very quickly to the arts community of the moment, that of Maurice Denis, Albert Besnard, Desvallières Georges, Jacques-Emile Blanche, Lucien Simon, Emile-Rene Menard, Aman-Jean, etc. His studio, it will last a lifetime, is installed Boissonade street. She lives next door as the painter Raymond Legueult and on the other side of the street, Conrad Kickert with whom she befriends. She is also godmother to her daughter Anne. Returned to Australia in 1914, she learns on the boat the outbreak of the First World War and decided to leave immediately "support its friends" in France. She then engages in the French Red Cross. The period 1918-1920, "First manner", sees its production paintings in soft tones (tempera), portraits (nos70 72), flowers, interiors (73) where each object or fabric armchair (51), the same character, rest quietly in his place and is part of the intimacy of the whole. However, the years 1920-1938 were marked by great changes and abundant production of full force, openness and scale. It was in his workshop that includes the sketches made outdoors during his stay in Savoy (nos 60 and 63) (Château de Villeneuve Cognin, Talloires, our 53 and 69), on the Basque coast (Guéthary (our 56 and 57), Normandy or Scotland, or during trips she made in Austria, Russia, Italy, Morocco and Switzerland. Bessie Davidson is the Vice President of the Group of FAM (Female Artistes Modernes) from 1932 to 1936 , Vice President of Fair Women Painters and Sculptors, founder of the Salon des Tuileries, a member of the Salon of the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts, the Salon des Independants, the Salon d'Automne member. exhibitions and fairs and then follow one another we see Bessie Davidson exhibiting with Mary Cassatt, Olga Boznanska, Tamara de Lempicka, Mela Muter, Chana Orloff, Anita Conti, Marie Laurencin, Jacqueline Marval, Marie Bracquemond, Camille Claudel, Suzanne Valadon, etc. the museums in Canberra Adelaide, Edinburgh, Kirkcaldy, The Hague, and in France, Paris, Rouen, Beaune, Belfort and Roubaix (pool) have some of his works. Bessie Davidson has hardly looked success. Full "Grande Dame" of nobility and generosity, she was also a great artist: his work remains that of an uncompromising Scottish born in Australia, a country of wide open spaces, and deeply imbued with French culture. Internet Sources: Wikipedia & www.Conrad-Kickert.org In the introduction to the exhibition catalog of 1929, sixty-three paintings of Bessie Davidson to Escalle gallery in Paris, his teacher René Xavier Prinet wrote: "S 'it is true, as stated by Eugène Delacroix, a table must be above all a feast for the eyes, Bessie Davidson, would sant doubt delighted this great artist. he had been seduced like us, by his ingenuity to use all the resources of color, relying on neutral, making themselves sing, kept in all the essential to any good paint distinction. Whether Bessie Davidson be tempted by the cheek of a child, by a distant mountain slopes of Savoy, with the result that her servant offers him or flower that adorns the table, it is always by the power and delicacy of tone, rather than the form it succeeds to express his feeling.'s light interiors, by distributing the objects, seems a caress of the sun and the variety of its output always reflects a sensitivity on the alert, in the presence of the effects of the hazards of travel or life offer him daily. Bessie Davidson is a Celtic Britain born in Australia, and because Celtic, beautiful gifts as a colorist, his qualities of composition naturally united to the French culture by adopting the measure and taste. It is entirely from home. It will be understood that I am especially proud to have guided the evolution of this artist, who encouraged talent with a burning desire and hard work has each year and gradually asserted to report that my friend also a big heart that has love France at its most tragic moments’.
Publishing details: photocopied section of catalogue, 2014
Location: 38