Paul ANDREZ, pseudonym of Vlaho BUKOVAC (Ragusa Vecchia (Cavtat), 1855, Prague, 1922) La belle au kimono, trompe-l'œil Oil on canvas Signed and dated 'P.ANDREZ / 1890' lower left The beauty in the kimono, oil on canvas, signed and dated, by P. Andrez 28.74 x 36.22 in. 73.0 x 92.0 cm Provenance: Gérard Lévy Collection ; Then by descent Exhibitions: Or et couleur: le cadre dans la seconde moitié du dix-neuvième siècle, Paris, Musée d'Orsay, 19 June - 24 September 1989, cat. no. 48: "Portrait de Femme". Triumph der Schöneit / Die Epoche der Salonmarelei von Makart bis Rossetti, Krems (Austria), Kunsthalle, 5 March - 30 July 2006, reproduced p. 43 : "Japaneirin in einem Rahmen". Bibliography: Celebonovic, Aleksa, Peinture kitsch ou réalisme bourgeois, l'art pompier dans le monde, Paris, Seghers, 1974, reproduced on p. 176: "Portrait de Femme". Cahn, Isabelle, Cadres de Peintres, Paris, Réunion des Musées Nationaux / Hermann, Editeurs des Sciences et des Arts, 1989, p. 105, reproduced p. 41, cat. no. 18: "Portrait de Femme". In a letter to Gérard Lévy in March 1978<a href="about:blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank" style="color: black;">[1]</a>, Croatian art historian Vera Kružić Uchytil (1930-2012) identified the author of this strange painting, which she had discovered by consulting Aleksa Celebonovic's book on firefighter art published in 1974<a href="about:blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank" style="color: black;">[2]</a>. The artist in question was Vlaho Bukovac, a ragusain painter, Austrian citizen of Dalmatian origin, who became Czechoslovakian towards the end of his life. During his time in Paris, he used the pseudonym "Paul Andrez" in order to sell some of his paintings more easily. Trained by Alexandre Cabanel at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, he exhibited at the Salon des Artistes Français from 1878 to 1887, and won a bronze medal at the 1889 Paris Universal Exhibition. In 1892, he exhibited two works at the Salon under the name of Paul Andrez: a portrait and a Fantasy that is today unidentified (cat. no. 16), before returning the following year to Austria-Hungary, where he became a teacher at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague. Using a seductive trompe-l'œil, Bukovac amuses himself by depicting on our canvas a young woman in a kimono leaping joyfully out of her painted frame to meet the viewer. This theme of the subject cramped in its frame was one of the commonplaces of nineteenth-century Salon caricaturists. In this way, the model humorously transgresses the limits of her painting to break into the real world. <a href="about:blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">[1]</a> Typed letter signed by Vera Kružić Uchytil to Gérard Lévy, dated 17 March 1978, private archive. <a href="about:blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">[2]</a> Celebonovic, Aleksa, Peinture kitsch ou réalisme bourgeois, l'art pompier dans le monde, Paris, Seghers, 1974, reproduced p. 176. Paul ANDREZ, pseudonym of Vlaho BUKOVAC (Ragusa Vecchia (Cavtat), 1855, Prague, 1922) 73.0 x 92.0 cm In a letter to Gérard Lévy in March 1978<a href="about:blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank" style="color: black;">[1]</a>, Croatian art historian Vera Kružić Uchytil (1930-2012) identified the author of this strange painting, which she had discovered by consulting Aleksa Celebonovic's book on firefighter art published in 1974<a href="about:blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank" style="color: black;">[2]</a>. The artist in question was Vlaho Bukovac, a ragusain painter, Austrian citizen of Dalmatian origin, who became Czechoslovakian towards the end of his life. During his time in Paris, he used the pseudonym "Paul Andrez" in order to sell some of his paintings more easily. Trained by Alexandre Cabanel at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, he exhibited at the Salon des Artistes Français from 1878 to 1887, and won a bronze medal at the 1889 Paris Universal Exhibition. In 1892, he exhibited two works at the Salon under the name of Paul Andrez: a portrait and a Fantasy that is today unidentified (cat. no. 16), before returning the following year to Austria-Hungary, where he became a teacher at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague. Using a seductive trompe-l'œil, Bukovac amuses himself by depicting on our canvas a young woman in a kimono leaping joyfully out of her painted frame to meet the viewer. This theme of the subject cramped in its frame was one of the commonplaces of nineteenth-century Salon caricaturists. In this way, the model humorously transgresses the limits of her painting to break into the real world. <a href="about:blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">[1]</a> Typed letter signed by Vera Kružić Uchytil to Gérard Lévy, dated 17 March 1978, private archive. <a href="about:blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">[2]</a> Celebonovic, Aleksa, Peinture kitsch ou réalisme bourgeois, l'art pompier dans le monde, Paris, Seghers, 1974, reproduced p. 176.