Jean Beraud, (1849-1936)
Detail; Rond-Point des Champs-Élysées
Oil on panel
14¾ by 22⅛ in, 37.4 by 56.2 cm
Private collection
Jean Beraud, (1849-1936)
In front of the Theater de Vaudeville in Paris
Oil canvas
58 x 40 cm
Private collection
Jean Béraud (1849–1935)
Boulevard des Capucines and the Vaudeville theater, c. 1889
Oil on canvas
Height: 35 cm Length: 51 cm
Carnavalet Museum, Paris
The Théâtre du Vaudeville was a theatre in Paris. It opened on 12 January 1792 on rue de Chartres.
After it burned down in 1838, the Vaudeville temporarily based itself on boulevard de Bonne-Nouvelle before in 1841 setting up in the Salle de la Bourse on the Place de la Bourse in the 2e arrondissement.
From 1866 to 1868, a new Théâtre du Vaudeville was built on boulevard des Capucines, at the corner of Rue de la Chaussée-d'Antin, in the 9e arrondissement. Although the Vaudeville continued as a commercial boulevard playhouse, it occasionally leased its stage to new experimentalist plays of the Independent Theatre movement.
In 1927, this building was acquired by Paramount and transformed into the cinema it is today, under the name the Paramount Opéra then. More on The Théâtre du Vaudeville
Béraud was born in Saint Petersburg. His father (also called Jean) was a sculptor and was likely working on the site of St. Isaac's Cathedral at the time of his son's birth. Béraud's mother was one Geneviève Eugénie Jacquin; following the death of Béraud's father, the family moved to Paris. Béraud was in the process of being educated as a lawyer until the occupation of Paris during the Franco-Prussian war in 1870.
Jean Béraud, 1849 - 1935
La Marseillaise (Bastille Day), c. 1880
Oil on canvas
14 3/4 by 22 in., 37.5 by 55.8 cm
Private collection
Exuberantly singing the Marseillaise, a group of workmen, artists, students and shopkeepers parade westward along the flag-draped rue St. Antoine from the Place de la Bastille towards the center of town. In the background rises the Colonne de Juillet, erected on the former site of the Bastille prison as a memorial to the July Revolution of 1830.
All of these people parade, while a few people from different milieus are grouped on the sidewalk. At the far right, a well-to-do family has come upon the parade, with mixed reactions. The young father steps forward enthusiastically to salute the marchers, while his wife looks on holding her daughter back from the throng. Over her shoulder, her father regards the boisterous crowd with wariness and even dismay, suggesting the still strong presence of the haute-bourgeoisie. In front of this family are a couple from the country more interested in their own flirtation than the parade.
First celebrated in 1790, Bastille Day commemorates the inaugural event of the French Revolution; July 14, 1789; the storming of the Bastille people of Paris. Celebrating Bastille Day was suppressed by successive French regimes including by Napoleon, for it symbolized the death of Absolutism and the birth of the Republic. In fact, the parade in 1880 that Béraud has painted here was one of the first celebrations of the anniversary since 1790.
"La Marseillaise" is the national anthem of France. The song was written in 1792 by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle in Strasbourg after the declaration of war by France against Austria, and was originally titled "Chant de guerre pour l'Armée du Rhin". More on La Marseillaise
Jean Béraud, 1849 - 1935
On the Way Back from the Funeral, c. 1876
Oil on canvas
66.0 × 53.3 cm
Private collection
Béraud became a student of Léon Bonnat, and exhibited his paintings at the Salon for the first time in 1872. However, he did not gain recognition until 1876, with his On the Way Back from the Funeral. He exhibited with the Society of French Watercolorists at the 1889 World's Fair in Paris.
Jean Béraud (1849–1935)
Le Boulevard St. Denis, Paris, before 1935
Oil and canvas
Height: 37 cm (14.5 in); Width: 55 cm (21.6 in)
Private collection
Rue Saint-Denis is one of the oldest streets in Paris. Its route was first laid out in the 1st century by the Romans, and then extended to the north in the Middle Ages. From the Middle Ages to the present day, the street has been notorious as a place of prostitution. Its name derives from it being the historic route to Saint-Denis. More on Rue Saint-Denis
He painted many scenes of Parisian daily life during the Belle Époque in a style that stands somewhere between the academic art of the Salon and that of the Impressionists. He received the Légion d'honneur in 1894.
Jean Béraud (1849–1935)
The Funeral of Victor Hugo at the Arc de Triomphe, c. 1885
Oil on panel
31.5 x 35.0 cm
Hôtel Carnavalet, Paris, France
Béraud's paintings often included truth-based humour and mockery of late 19th-century Parisian life, along with frequent appearances of biblical characters in then contemporary situations.
Jean Béraud, (French, 1849-1935)
The Magdalen at the House of the Pharisees, c. 1891
Oil on canvas
Height: 104.0 cm; Width: 131.0 cm
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
Represented: Christ; Duc-Quercy Antoine (1856-1934); Saint Mary Magdalene; Pougy Liane de, née Anne-Marie Chassaigne, wife of Henri Pourpre then of Prince Georges Ghika (1869-1950); Simon the Pharisee; Renan Ernest (1823-1892); Taine Hippolyte (1828-1893); Weiss Jean-Jacques (1827-1891); Lemoinne John (1815-1892); Taigny Edmond; Chevreul Eugène (1786-1889); Dumas Alexandre fils (1824-1895); Proust Adrien Dr (1834-1903); Béraud Jean (1848-1935).
Paintings such as Mary Magdalene in the House of the Pharisees aroused controversy when exhibited, because of these themes.
Jean Béraud, (French, 1849-1935)
Valmy and Léa, c. 1885-1895
Brush and brown wash, heightened with white gouache, over graphite
Beige wove paper, laid down on cardboard
36 x 51.7 cm (14 3/16 x 20 3/8 in.)
Béraud was one of several artists at the end of the 19th century who favored the café-concert as a subject. In the outdoor café-concerts of Paris, a broad urban audience could enjoy singing and stage routines along with food and drink. In this scene, Valmy thrusts up his arm in a gesture to the audience, while his partner, Lea, kicks her leg up in the cancan, an exuberant French dance. For this nighttime scene, Béraud made effective use of washes and white gouache heightening in depicting the glowing orbs of artificial light and the hidden stage lights illuminating the performers from below. More on this work
Jean Béraud, 1849 - 1935
À la salle Graffard/ At the Graffard room, c. 1884
Oil on canvas
89 x 117 cm; 35 x 46 in
Private collection
Established in 1856 on the site of a former ballroom at the Armes de France , the Graffard ball was located on Boulevard Ménilmontant, in the heart of popular Paris. It was occasionally used as a room for political meetings .
With At the Graffard room, Béraud painted a scene evoking political instability and unrest in France in the early 1880s.
The central character of the painting, the speaker standing eloquently supports his peroration which unleashes the enthusiasm of the audience, drowned in the thick smoke of the pipes.
At the Graffard room shows a gathering of men, commoners, workers and people of modest means, whose costume contrasts with that of journalists in fur coats and top hats. Women are almost absent. Béraud, great lover of the beauty, the grace and the natural elegance of the woman, must have little appreciated those which left their role and intervened in the activities reserved at the time to the men. More on At the Graffard
Towards the end of the 19th century, Béraud dedicated less time to his own painting but worked on numerous exhibition committees, including the Salon de la Société Nationale. Béraud never married and had no children. He died in Paris on October 4, 1935, and is buried in Montparnasse Cemetery beside his mother. More on ean Béraud
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