Portrieux, The Bathing Cabins, Opus 185 (Beach of the Countess)
Framed: 22 1/2 × 28 × 2 3/4 inches (57.15 × 71.12 × 6.99 cm)
- 127
Sixième exposition de la Société des Artistes indépendants, Pavillon de la Ville de Paris, March 20–April 27, 1890, no. 741, as La mer—De Portrieux (Côtes-du-Nord), juin, juillet, août, septembre 1888, Op. 185.
Vincent van Gogh en zijn tijdgenoten, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, September 6
–November 2, 1930, no. 280, as Het strand.Manet to Matisse: Impressionist Masters from the Marion and Henry Bloch Collection
, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, June 9–September 9, 2007, no. 20, as Portrieux, The Bathing Cabins, Opus 185 (Beach of the Countess) (Portrieux, les cabines, Opus 185 [Plage de la comtesse]).Paul Signac depicted a stretch of a beach on the Brittany coast in the early morning, before the arrival of bathers. Animating his scene with pops of bright color and brushstrokes that vary in size and shape, Signac juxtaposed complementary hues such as blue and orange, creating the impression of flickering light. This symphony of harmonious effects is underscored by Signac’s practice of giving his paintings opus numbers in the fashion of musical compositions.
Paul Signac (1863–1935), Paris, 1888–no later than 1902;
Given by the artist to Paul Merme, Paris, by 1902 [1];
Dikran Garabed Kelekian (1868–1951), Paris and New York, by September 6, 1930–January 18, 1935 [2];
Purchased at his sale, Paintings, Watercolors, and Drawings of the Moderns: The Private Collection of Dikran G. Kelekian, Rains Galleries, New York, January 18, 1935, lot 36, as The Seashore [3];
Mollie Bragno (née Netcher, 1923–2002), Chicago [4];
With Richard L. Feigen and Co., Chicago, as La Plage, by 1959 [5];
Purchased from Feigen by Jerome Kane Ohrbach (1908–1990), Los Angeles, 1959–June 28, 1990 [6];
Jerome K. Ohrbach Trust, 1990–November 8, 1994 [7];
Purchased from the Ohrbach Trust, through Richard L. Feigen and Co., New York, by Marion (née Helzberg, 1931–2013) and Henry (1922–2019) Bloch, Shawnee Mission, KS, November 8, 1994–June 15, 2015;
Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 2015.
NOTES:
[1] During Signac’s lifetime, he created three chronological lists of his paintings: the cahier d’opus (compiled 1887–1902), the cahier manuscript (compiled 1902–1909), and the pré-catalogue (compiled 1929–1932). All three inventories mention a collector named Merme in connection with Portrieux, The Bathing Cabins, Opus 185 (Beach of the Countess). The cahier d’opus states that the painting was "offert à P. Merme" (given to P. Merme), indicating that this transaction must have taken place prior to 1902. The cahier manuscript and pré-catalogue both list "Merme" next to or beneath the painting’s title.
See Archives Paul Signac, Paris.Françoise Cachin identified this individual as "Paul Merme, Paris"; see Françoise Cachin, Signac: Catalogue raisonné de l’œuvre peint (Paris: Éditions Gallimard, 2000), no. 169, p. 188.
Several people with this first and last name are known; one likely candidate is Paul Félix Merme (1847–1915), Inspecteur des services administratives et financiers de la marine et des colonies, but it has not been possible to confirm this connection.[2] The painting belonged to Kelekian by 1930 because he lent it to the
Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, for the exhibition Vincent van Gogh en zijn tijdgenoten (September 6–November 2, 1930). His descendants have no information about when he acquired the landscape or to whom he sold it in 1935; see letter from Françoise Cachin to Charles D. Kelekian, May 21, 1984, and letter from Nanette B. Kelekian to Françoise Cachin, May 29, 1984, Archives Paul Signac, Paris, copies in NAMA curatorial files.[3] Multiple copies of the Rains Galleries sale catalogue are annotated with the purchase price, but none of them record the buyer’s name.
[4] Married three times over the course of her life, Bragno died single and childless. Her parents, Charles Netcher Jr. (1892–1931) and Gladys Netcher (née Oliver, 1892–1947), collected art and donated certain objects to the Art Institute of Chicago, but there is no evidence that they owned Portrieux, The Bathing Cabins, Opus 185 prior to their daughter. Bragno’s living relatives have no information about her collection. See email from Maria Stave, niece of Mollie Bragno, to Brigid M. Boyle, NAMA, August 9, 2022, NAMA curatorial files.
[5] Encapsulated on the backing board is a Richard L. Feigen and Co. label for "Paul Signac, La Plage, 1888" bearing the address "1444 Astor Street, Chicago 10, Illinois." No stock number is listed for the painting. Feigen opened his Chicago gallery in 1957, so he must have acquired Portrieux, The Bathing Cabins, Opus 185 between 1957 and 1959.
[6] For the year of acquisition, see The Collection of Jerome K. Ohrbach (New York: Sotheby’s, November 13, 1990), lot 10. Richard L. Feigen and Co. was unable to confirm their exact date of sale to Ohrbach in 1959. See emails between Brigid M. Boyle, NAMA, and Cynthia Conti, Richard L. Feigen and Co., August 9–10, 2022, NAMA curatorial files.
[7] This painting was offered for sale by the Jerome K. Ohrbach Trust at The Collection of Jerome K. Ohrbach, Sotheby’s, New York, November 13, 1990, lot 10, but failed to sell. The Ohrbach Trust subsequently placed the painting on consignment with Richard L. Feigen and Co. from December 3, 1993 to November 8, 1994. To our knowledge, Sotheby’s did not have a part interest in the painting’s eventual sale. See email from Emelia Scheidt, Richard L. Feigen and Co., to Meghan Gray, NAMA, April 13, 2015, and email from Cynthia Conti, Richard L. Feigen and Co., to Brigid M. Boyle, NAMA, August 16, 2022, NAMA curatorial files.
Société des Artistes indépendants: Peintres, sculpteurs, graveurs, dessinateurs et architectes; Catalogue des œuvres exposées, exh. cat. (Paris: Imprimerie A. Lahure, 1890), 37 [repr., in Theodore Reff, ed., Modern Art in Paris: Two-Hundred Catalogues of the Major Exhibitions Reproduced in Facsimile in Forty-Seven Volumes, vol. 9, Salons of the "Indépendants" 1884–1891 (New York: Garland, 1981), unpaginated], as La mer—De Portrieux (Côtes-du-Nord), juin, juillet, août, septembre 1888, Op. 185.
Jules Christophe, "Causerie: L’Impressionnisme; L’exposition des artistes indépendants," Journal des artistes, no. 13 (April 6, 1890): 102.
Gustave Geffroy, "Chronique d’art: Indépendants," La Revue d’Aujourd’hui 1, no. 4 (April 15, 1890): 270.
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Gustave Coquiot, Les indépendants: 1884–1920 (Paris: Librairie Ollendorff, [1921]), 14.
Vincent van Gogh en zijn tijdgenooten, exh. cat. (Amsterdam: Stedelijk Museum, 1930), 98, as Het strand.
Paintings, Watercolors, and Drawings of the Moderns: The Private Collection of Dikran G. Kelekian, Esq. (New York: Rains Galleries, January 18, 1935), 16, (repro.), as The Seashore.
Marie-Thérèse Lemoyne de Forges, Signac, exh. cat. (Paris: Ministère d’état, Affaires culturelles, 1963), 29.
Sophie Monneret, L’impressionnisme et son époque: Dictionnaire international illustré (Paris: Editions Denoël, 1979), 2:256.
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Françoise Cachin, Signac: Catalogue raisonné de l’œuvre peint (Paris: Éditions Gallimard, 2000), no. 169, pp. 188, 356, 358, (repro.), as Portrieux. Les Cabines. Opus 185 (plage de la Comtesse).
Marina Ferretti-Bocquillon et al., Signac, 1863–1935, exh. cat. (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2001), 133, 303.
Anne Distel, Signac: Au temps d’harmonie, exh. cat. (Paris: Gallimard / Réunion des musées nationaux, 2001), 47.
Françoise Cachin and Marina Ferretti-Bocquillon, P. Signac, exh. cat. (Paris: A.D.A.G.P., 2003), 48, 262, as Portrieux. Les Cabines.
Jane Munro, French Impressionists (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 132.
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Richard R. Brettell and Joachim Pissarro, Manet to Matisse: Impressionist Masters from the Marion and Henry Bloch Collection, exh. cat. (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2007), 11, 16–17, 108–11, 159–60, (repro.), as Portrieux, The Bathing Cabins, Opus 185 (Beach of the Countess) (Portrieux, Les cabines, Opus 185 [Plage de la comtesse]).
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Nancy Staab, "Van Gogh is a Go!" 435: Kansas City’s Magazine (September 2015): 76.
Marianne Jakobi, Gauguin-Signac: La genèse du titre contemporain (Paris: CNRS Éditions, 2015), 259, (repro.), as Op. 185 and Portrieux, Les Cabines, Opus 185.
Seurat, Van Gogh, Mondrian: Il post-impressionismo in Europa, exh. cat. (Milan: 24 ORE Cultura, 2015), 66.
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Marina Ferretti Bocquillon, Paul Signac, l’air du large, exh. cat. (Rouen: Éditions des Falaises, 2021), 78, (repro.), as Portrieux. Les Cabines; Opus 185.
Paul Signac, Journal: 1894–1909, ed. Charlotte Hellman (Paris: Gallimard, 2021), 184n374.
Brigid M. Boyle, “Paul Signac, Portrieux, The Bathing Cabins, Opus 185 (Beach of the Countess), 1888,” catalogue entry in French Paintings, 1600–1945: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023), https://doi.org/10.37764/78973.5.730.5407.
