From the Macquarie exhibition to Rupert Henderson, Sydney; thence by descent;
Leonard Joel, Melbourne, 29 August 2010, Lot 55
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Lloyd Rees
Square Rene Viviani, 1953
SOLD
Catalogue number: 5
oil on canvas on board
38.00 x 51.50
signed & dated L. Rees 53 l.l.; bearing title No 1 Square Rene Viviani 65Gns verso; Macquarie Galleries label also verso
Lloyd Rees, Macquarie Galleries, Sydney, March 1954, no. 1
Ren Free, Lloyd Rees, 1972, Lansdowne Press, Melbourne, Australia, p. 63; & cat no 0153 (see also pp 73 & 74 for illustrations of other works painted on the same trip - Chartres and the Champs Elyses)
In 1952/3, Lloyd Rees made his first trip back to Europe since 1924, visiting Italy, England (May to July 1953) and France; March and August were spent in Paris sketching and painting many of the notable landmarks. Following the sketches from England, the second group of Rees Paris sketches are entitled Paris, Pont Neuf, Boulevard S. Michel, Rue St Julien, Notre Dame, Square Viviani, Rue Furstenburg, Atelier Delacroix, Rue Garance, Court of Louvre, the Cit, the Louvre, Seine, Chartres, Millets House, and at the back are pages with impressions of a visit to the Louvre and to the Folies Bergres. Free, op cit, p 63 Whilst the name of Rene Viviani may not be familiar (he was a government minister in the 1920s) visitors to Paris will very likely have crossed the Square without realising. It is centrally situated on the Left Bank on the edge of the Latin Quarter, to the north of the cathedral of Notre Dame, of which it commands a fine view from across the river. Anyone walking between the two can hardly avoid it. From a more formal point of view, in these Paris paintings we find Rees exploring both high and low angle perspectives: the Avenue des Champs Elyses, for instance, is seen from a high viewpoint above the Place de la Concorde looking towards the Arc de Triomphe; in other works, of which Rue St Julien le Pauvre and Square Rene Viviani are typical, he places himself looking up at nearby buildings. For the latter, the artist positioned himself near the old church of St Julien le Pauvre and painted the eastern side of the square, thus focusing on its enclosed and intimate nature and omitting the grand vista of the cathedral, which would be to the left of the composition. Paris was a cure for his [previous] illness and the feeling of home almost overwhelmed him. It was not the grandeur of the cathedrals now; there was no crushing strength of the Louvre to fight. Versailles at dusk, the gardens of the Tuileries... a street in Chartres, all delighted Rees, During that visit I painted in the open in quiet squares, and even in busy streets. Perhaps not a wise thing to do (although so many do it here) but I must confess to a sentimental urge to tread the ground and haunt the places where great artists have lived and worked. ........ The paintings of Europe were exhibited at the Macquarie Galleries, Sydney, on his return. They were sensitive views, more successful than the overambitious large Sydney works.
Free, op cit, p. 63
Exhibition Catalogue
Since its establishment in 1984, the Charles Nodrum Gallery’s exhibition program embraces a diversity of media and styles - from painting, sculpture & works on paper to graphics and photography; from figurative, geometric, gestural, surrealist & social comment to installation & conceptually based work.