Georges MANZANA PISSARRO (1871-1961) Lot n° 6

Avant le mariage, 1952 Oils on hardboard, signed and dated 31 1/4 x 19 1/2 in. It comes as no surprise that Georges Manzana-Pissarro, the third son of the artist Camille Pissarro, learned to paint with his father: a key figure in Impressionist and modern painting. However, he also worked as a decorative artist. During a trip to England, he delightedly discovered the Arts and Crafts movement, and found creating decorative objects and furniture an enriching means of expression very different from painting. In the aftermath of Impressionism, he focused considerably on nature in his early works, and frequently painted land­scapes around Paris. He began his career by taking his grandmother's name, Man­zana, finally adding it to his surname: Man­zana-Pissarro. His father's influence is evident in all his Neo-Impressionist works. The works presented here illustrate another facet of the artist's output. After discov­ering Paul Gauguin's paintings, Georges Manzana-Pissarro found a new source of inspiration in these new images of dis­tant islands and the exotic atmosphere of Polynesia. The tales of the Thousand and One Nights were also a revelation to him. Following these discoveries, he began depicting a magical Orientalist world high­lighted with gold, silver and bronze. The two oils here are speaking examples. They draw us into an intimate scene where two young women are preparing for a wedding, putting on their most ravishing garb in a luxuriant setting. An accomplished artist, Manzana-Pissarro exhibited regularly at the Salon d'Automne and the Salon des Indépendants. Paul Durand-Ruel and Eugène Druet regularly sold his works in their galleries. In 1907, Ambroise Vollard paid tribute to him with a show in his space, and in 1914, the Musée des Arts Décoratifs de Paris devoted a solo exhibition to him, featuring some 311 of his works.