“… a land of lilies and soft blue nights…”
(Thomas Burke, Limehouse Nights: The Sign of the Lamp)
Ferdinand du Puigaudeau (1864-1930), Breton Girls with Chinese Lanterns in Pont-Aven (Bretonnes aux lampions à pont-aven), 1896
Many late nineteenth century painters such as Paul Gauguin, Emile Bernard, Charles Laval, and Roderic O’Conor found their artistic haven in Pont-Aven; a commune in Brittany in the north of France. The traditional black and white costumes worn by Breton women and the local customs and traditions of the Breton people were a sort of refuge from the cold, calculated and rationalised modern world and the bustling, ever-changing streets of Paris. Many other artists such as Vincent van Gogh, Jakub Schikaneder, Willard Metcalf, Alexandre Benois, and Władysław Ślewiński had also found inspiration in the costumes of Breton woman, their black garments and white headwear, ascetic and simple, removed from time. What the Pre-Raphaelites had found in their idealised visions of the Arthurian legends and the Medieval times, the Post-Impressionist artists had found in the dreamy town of Pont-Aven.
The particular style developed there by Gauguin and Emile Bernard is referred to as the Pont-Aven School, but the painting we are talking about today is something completely different. Ferdinand du Puigaudeau’s painting “Breton Girls with Chinese Lanterns in Pont-Aven” painted in 1896 features the motif of the Breton girls in their traditional garments but this time the motif is combined with Chinoiserie; the European interpretation and imitation of Chinese and other East Asian artistic traditions. Chinoiserie is a term often connected tied with the art of Rococo. In Du Puigaudeau’s painting the Chinoiserie-motif are the Chinese lanterns and the effect is mesmerising. The overall mood of the painting is vivacious, vibrant and playful and brings the otherwise sombre motif of Breton women’s traditional garments to a whole new level. The diagonal composition that starts with the girl at the forefront of the festival parade and ends with a building in the distance with a pagoda-style roof gives a dynamic and playful mood to the painting and reveals the influence of Japanese art on Du Puigaudeau.
The girls, with their flowing garments dancing in the nocturnal breeze, look like fairies. I love the way the glow of the lanterns colours their dresses and the space around them, as if the magic of the lanterns is spilling onto the rest of the scene, as if the light of the lanters is liquid colour spilling like a river onto the space around the girls; blue, red, yellow… I cannot help but think of the stories from Thomas Burke’s short-story collection “Limehouse Nights”, such as “The Chink and the Child” which inspired the film “Broken Blossoms” (1919) starring the lovely moon-faced Lilian Gish, because the element of Chinoiserie is woven into each of these stories and motifs such as lanterns helps evoke the magical, oriental spirit that pervades Du Puigaudeau’s painting as well as Burke’s stories. Another thing that comes to mind is definitelly Debussy’s whimsical “Sonata for Flute, Viola and Harp in F Major” which I absolutely adore.
Byron's Muse 