Paintings Drawings Sculptures 2016 - Jean Luc Baroni

Paul-César Helleu
Vannes 1859 - 1927 Paris
39
Portrait of Suzanne Neret in Profile, Wearing a
Pink and Black Hat
Pencil and pastel. Laid down on card. Signed and
inscribed: Helleu/ à..m.lle Suzanne.
600 x 460 mm (23 5 /8 x 18 1 /8 in.)
Provenance: Giancarlo Baroni, Switzerland.
Literature: This work will be included in the forthcoming
catalogue raisonné, now in preparation by l’Association
des Amis de Paul César Helleu, as no. DE-1896.
Helleu trained at the École des Beaux Arts under
Gérôme but was more in sympathy with plein air artists
than those of the academic tradition. He became friends
with Degas and Monet and also with the American born
painters Whistler and Sargent and in Giovanni Boldini,
found a kindred spirit. Early in his career as a portraitist
he met Alice Guérin, daughter of one of his sitters
and she became his wife and favourite model. Helleu
lived amongst the beau monde, and partly inspired the
figure of the dashing painter Elstir in Marcel Proust’s À
la recherche du temps perdu. An instinctively brilliant
draughtsman and pastellist, he also became a virtuoso
etcher; his greatest flair was as a society portraitist and
indeed he was hugely successful not only in Paris but
in London and New York. The sea and sailing became,
after art, his chief occupation and with his work in such
demand, he was able to own four fine yachts. In 1912,
on his second visit to America, he was commissioned
to design the ceiling of the Great Hall of Grand
Central Station in New York which he turned into an
extraordinary vision of the night sky with the signs of
the zodiac.
This superb example of Helleu’s pastel technique has
all his customary brilliance and probably dates from
around 1915. The relaxed pose, limpid eye and cool
skin of the sitter, Suzanne, the curls of her red hair
contained by the brim of her velvet edged hat, are all
captured with Helleu’s particular energy. Helleu was
a friend of Gaston Neret, Suzanne’s father. He was a
regular visitor at the Neret family’s private villa (hôtel
particulier) in the Villa Dupont (an exclusive address in
the aristocratic 16ème arrondissement of Paris). There,
Helleu frequently portrayed Suzanne, as well as her
sisters Marie and Henriette.
We are grateful to Maître Neret-Minet for providing the
information concerning the sitter.
Translated from a text by Mario Fagioli
148
actual size detail