MAURICE UTRILLO (1883-1955)


Moulin de la Galette signed 'Maurice, Utrillo.V.' (lower right)oil on canvas18 1/4 x 22 in (46.4 x 55.9 cm)Painted circa 1951
|ProvenanceFindlay Galleries, Chicago.Private collection (acquired in 1963, and sold: Shapiro Auctions, June 2, 2018, lot 35).Acquired at the above sale by the present owner.LiteratureP. Pétridès, L'oeuvre complet de Maurice Utrillo, vol. III, Paris, 1969, no. 2376 (illustrated p. 343).Maurice Utrillo was a prolific artist who fastidiously returned to the same subject matter repeatedly to examine nuances of light, seasonal changes, and human activity. Moulin de la Galette is one of Utrillo's finest examples from his serial examination of this subject matter. Built in 1622, Moulin de la Galette originally operated as a mill producing small brown bread, or galettes. In 1830 the milk that was sold with the famed galettes was replaced with wine, and in 1833 dancing was introduced at the windmill, signally a cultural and literal change in the windmill's use.The Moulin de la Galette thus transformed into a Montmartre mainstay of leisure and entertainment, and as a result was a source of inspiration to many important artists during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The likes of Pissarro, Toulouse-Lautrec, and van Gogh depicted the famed cabaret. Renoir's Bal du Moulin de la Galette (1876) is considered one of the key masterpieces of Impressionism, and Picasso's very first Parisian painting (1900) depicts a convivial party at the Moulin de la Galette.Utrillo approached the popular site with his instantly recognizable, signature style. Unlike other artists who captured the dance hall's whirl of activity and the characters frequenting the guinguette café-concert, Utrillo depicts the Moulin de la Galette anchored in one of the archetypal Parisian street scenes that define his oeuvre. In the present work, the Moulin de la Galette squarely commands the center of the painting's composition and is crowned with a French flag. The soberly hued edifice is partially obscured by a pale green fence and flanked by cream walls and emerald foliage. A tantalizing glimpse of the iconic Sacre Coeur in the upper left-hand corner and a smattering of anonymous, colorfully clad figures in the foreground provide context, establishing the location and a sense of scale.Utrillo started painting his local surroundings in 1904 under the tutelage of his mother, Suzanne Valadon, and was one of the few painters of Montmartre whose origins were rooted in the neighborhood. He obsessively depicted the Moulin de la Galette from multiple vantage points and in a range of styles. Utrillo painted some outdoor scenes based in Brittany and Corsica, but his Parisian street scenes are his most famous and most numerous. Utrillo's Moulin de la Galette, a placid and quietly engaging daytime street scene so representative of his oeuvre, belies the raucous reputation of the celebrated eponymous establishment.