Edouard VUILLARD MADAME HESSEL EN NORMANDIE, 1905 During the summer of 1900, Edouard Vuillard joined Félix Valloton in Switzerland, where the latter had rented the Château de la Naz in Romanel near Lausanne. During his stay, Vuillard met Jos Hessel, director of the Galerie Bernheim-Jeune, and his wife, Lucie. A strong friendship founded on mutual respect soon sprang up between the couple and the painter, especially after the divorce of Misia and Thadée Natanson. Lucie Hessel, whose optimistic personality stimulated the painter's entire existence, became his new muse. Overflowing with artistic advice, she encouraged him in his work, and her affectionate nature led her to invite him to her home in Paris every evening. Attentive to the well being of this hardened bachelor, she invited him to spend time in the villas she rented in Normandy and Britanny. When Vuillard's mother died in 1928, Lucie Hessel offered him her country house in Clayes near Versailles where a room was reserved for his exclusive use year round. Vuillard executed numerous works that represent Lucie Hessel. In the living rooms of her Parisian apartments covered with paintings, she poses for a portrait or for an indoor scene. In her summer residences in the country, she lends her figure to many a memorable canvas. Starting in 1905, the Hessels rented the Château rouge in Amfreville, Normandy, where Vuillard painted Madame Hessel en Normandie that same year. We can immediately see that "a completely emotional pictorial space" - that of the artist - and an intimate approach to the subject are becoming a thing of the past. The sky, air, and light hold pride of place in works constructed using a traditional perspective. By painting his muse standing in a broad meadow in an impressionist vein, Vuillard opens the door to a new pictorial style and begins a new life in the world of the rich, elegant, and famous frequented by Lucie Hessel as their appointed painter. LITERATURE: 1 July - 1 October 2000, Musée de Saint-Tropez, 14 October - 7 January 2001, Musée cantonal des Beaux-Arts de Lausanne, Edouard Vuillard, La porte entrebâillée (articles by Jšrg Zutter and Jean-Paul Monery).