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Ferdinand Loyen du Puigaudeau

Ferdinand Loyen du Puigaudeau is a painter with an identity and character all his own. Though his work bears similarities to the Realist, Impressionist, Symbolist, and Romantic movements, he remained outside the mainstream of these styles. His painting appears full of contradictions; bold and yet restrained, with a mixture of technical know how and naiveté. Representative of a stylistic approach almost unknown in France, his work is even comparable to that of the American Luminist painters of the same period.

 

In 1886, du Puigaudeau made his first visit to the quiet seaside village of Pont-Aven. There he booked a room at Gloanec’s, a popular hotel for artists on a budget. It so happened that Paul Gauguin was also making his first visit and staying at the same hotel. Du Puigaudeau, along with a small number of aspiring artists were in a wholly unique position of observing and working alongside one of the most important painters of the late nineteenth century. Puigaudeau developed close relationships with Gauguin, Degas, Rysselberghe, Ensor and Bernard. Degas affectionately referred to du Puigaudeau as the Hermit of Kervaudu. This time spent at Pont-Aven would have a profound effect on the painter stylistically. He would soon enter the mature phase of his career after this experience which no doubt pushed him in a place that is still unique to this day.

Du Puigadeau's vision comes closest to the Romantic attitude toward nature. His love of the bold colors of nature brings him close to the American Luminist painters, such as Frederick Church and his greatest predecessor, the German artist Casper David Friedrich. Yet unlike Friedrich, du Puigadeau did not paint mountains and forests in all their vertical majesty but rather the horizontal expanses of sea and sky. It was not his aim to portray man lost in an overwhelming or hostile nature, but merely to show man face to face with creation, and participate in his role as spectator.