Lot 906: Richard Clague (American/Louisiana, 1821-1873)

Richard Clague (American/Louisiana, 1821-1873), "Louisiana Landscape with Goats near the Water's Edge", 1870, oil on canvas, signed lower right and pencil signed and dated on stretcher, 16-1/2" x 20-1/2". Presented in the original W. E. Seebold giltwood frame with framer's label en verso. Provenance: From the artist to the father of Leon Gibert of Monrepos (now Anadele's Plantation) on the Bogue Falaya River, St. Tammany Parish, Louisiana; thence by descent to his grandson William Gibert and his wife Rosalie Johnston; Private collection, Louisiana, 1983; Neal Auction Company, June 6, 1998, lot 291. Exhibited: Richard Clague Retrospective, November 17- December 30, 1974. New Orleans Museum of Art. Illustrated: Toledano, Roulhac. Richard Clague, 1821-1873. New Orleans: New Orleans Museum of Art, 1974. pl. 61, p. 95. Literature: Times-Picayune . Sunday, July 30, 1972. sect. 3, p. 4. Richard Clague's landscapes of daily life, of innocuous flora and fauna, are as rich in tradition as are the families through whose hands they have passed. At the time, portraiture was paramount, and no real interest had ever been paid to Southern scenery. Though he was academically trained at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in France, Clague was most influenced by the plein-air realism of the Barbizon School painters, who painted the peasantry and the environs of the Fontainebleau forest in situ. As Gustave Courbet, the "father" of French realism and a contemporary of Clague, once said in mocking jest of the art academies, "Show me an angel and I will paint it." Similarly, Clague focused on the world before him, turning rustic mundane scenes into pastorals that celebrate the subtropical climate. In the painting offered here, Clague uses light to capture the quiet reprieve from a hot summer's day; the burnt umber of the shade beneath the tree where the goats rest is juxtaposed by the sun-drenched path packed down by wagon tracks, and the reflections of the trees on the surface of the water are so pristine, Clague is able to capture just how stagnate the water on a bayou or river bank can be. This painting uses goats at rest to celebrate a Louisiana summer day in a setting so prosaic that it could be found on almost any settlement, farm or plantation in the area. Indeed, it could even be from the Gibert property on the Bogue Falaya River in St. Tammany Parish where the painting hung for almost a century before it was displayed at Clague's retrospective.

In generally good condition with scattered abrading and pinprick-sized losses, especially along edges where canvas meets frame. Evidence of past restoration: small scattered areas of inpainting in sky, especially along upper edge, and at central lower edge. Painting has been relined, but some time ago. Small area of pigment variation along center upper edge, corresponding to area of inpainting. Surface soiling.