Étienne Bignou (born 1891, d. 1950) was a French art dealer specializing in 19th and 20th century art.

Biography

Bignou first worked with his father-in-law, Bonjean, on rue Laffitte, a specialist in ancient art. Bignou took over the gallery in 1909, partnering with The Lefèvre Gallery in London and Alex Reid in Glasgow, which in 1926 joined to create Alex Reid & Lefèvre in London, of which Bignou became a director. In 1929, in association with Gaston and Josse

Bernheim-Jeune Bernheim-Jeune gallery is one of the oldest art galleries in Paris. Opened on Rue Laffitte in 1863 by Alexandre Bernheim (1839-1915), friend of Delacroix, Corot and Courbet, it changed location a few times before settling on Avenue Matignon. The ...

, Bignou bought the

Georges Petit Georges Petit (11 March 1856 – 12 May 1920) was a French art dealer, a key figure in the Paris art world and an important promoter and cultivator of Impressionist artists. Early career Petit was the son of François Petit, who founded the f ...

gallery on Rue de Sèze and appointed Georges Keller as director. Bignou organized a Matisse exhibition there in June–July 1931, Picasso in June–July 1932. After the closure of the Georges Petit gallery in 1933, Bignou set up the Bignou Gallery in Paris with a branch in New York run by Keller on 57th Street, which opened in 1935. He organized a Renoir exhibition there. After Bignou's death in 1950, Keller continued to run the gallery, then closed it in 1953 and joined Carstairs Gallery. Bignou acted as agent for the American art collector and philanthropist

Chester Dale Chester Dale (May 3, 1883 – December 16, 1962) was an American banker and patron of the arts. Dale earned large sums from working for the New York Stock Exchange, allowing him to collect 19th and 20th-century French paintings. Although he consi ...

, as well as supplying him with numerous artworks. According to Lynn H. Nicolas in The Rape of Europa, during World War II, Bignou entered into a profit sharing agreement with Martin Fabiani concerning the shipment of "429 paintings, drawing and watercolors by Renoir, 68 Cézannes, 57 Rouaults, 13 Gauguin, and so forth, to a grand total of 635" artworks. The paintings left on the '' SS Excalibur'' from

Lisbon Lisbon (; pt, Lisboa ) is the capital and largest city of Portugal, with an estimated population of 544,851 within its administrative limits in an area of 100.05 km2. Grande Lisboa, Lisbon's urban area extends beyond the city's administr ...

, Portugal on September 25, 1940, bound for Bignou's New York gallery, but were seized by the

British Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against F ...

and

H. Montgomery Hyde Harford Montgomery Hyde (14 August 190710 August 1989), born in Belfast, Ireland, was a barrister, politician (Ulster Unionist MP for Belfast North), prolific author and biographer. He was deselected by his party in 1959, losing his seat in th ...

Bermuda ) , anthem = "God Save the King" , song_type = National song , song = " Hail to Bermuda" , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , mapsize2 = , map_caption2 = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = , e ...

on October 3 on account of their enemy origin, and of doubts about the sympathies of Fabiani, and stored in Canada until released to Fabiani in 1949. Bignou had a collection of manuscripts and autographs which was dispersed by Pierre Bérès, from 1975. It included the first manuscript of Céline's ''

Voyage au Bout de la Nuit ''Journey to the End of the Night'' (french: Voyage au bout de la nuit, 1932) is the first novel by Louis-Ferdinand Céline. This semi-autobiographical work follows the adventures of Ferdinand Bardamu in the World War I, colonial Africa, the Un ...

'' that the writer had sold to the merchant for ten thousand francs and a painting by Renoir, on May 29, 1943. Bignou is buried in the Père-Lachaise cemetery (92nd division).

Nazi-looted art controversies

In 1945-6, ''Bignou'' was investigated by the OSS

Art Looting Investigation Unit The Art Looting Investigation Unit (ALIU) was a special intelligence unit during World War II whose mission was to gather information and write reports about Nazi art looting networks. Composed of only a few handpicked men, the small unit conducted ...

for his involvement in dealing in Nazi-looted art and listed as a Red Flag Name''.'' In recent years, several artworks that passed through Bignou were discovered to have been looted by Nazis or sold in forced sales or under duress by Jewish collectors during the

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...

. In 2013, ''Group of Trees'', 1890, a watercolour by

Paul Cézanne Paul Cézanne ( , , ; ; 19 January 1839 – 22 October 1906) was a French artist and Post-Impressionism, Post-Impressionist painter whose work laid the foundations of the transition from the 19th-century conception of artistic endeavour to a ...

, "surfaced" at the

National Gallery of Canada The National Gallery of Canada (french: Musée des beaux-arts du Canada), located in the capital city of Ottawa, Ontario, is Canada's national art museum. The museum's building takes up , with of space used for exhibiting art. It is one of the l ...

in Ottawa with a provenance that experts said required further verification as the British navy had seized it in a cargo of artworks sent by art dealer Fabiani to Bignou. In 2019, the Kunstmuseum in Bern came under scrutiny for Georges F. Keller's donations of artworks by artists like

Henri Matisse Henri Émile Benoît Matisse (; 31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French visual artist, known for both his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known prima ...

and

Salvador Dalí Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (; ; ; 11 May 190423 January 1989) was a Spanish Surrealism, surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, and the striking and bizarr ...

because of his association with Bignou, who was described as "sulferous" due to his art dealing with Germans during the Nazi occupation of France. The Swiss museum, which had also received artworks from the Gurlitt stash, announced that it would investigate the provenance of artworks donated by George F. Keller since his business partner Bignou collaborated with the Nazis.

Notes et references

Bibliography

Christian Zervos Christian Zervos ( el, Χρήστος Ζερβός; Argostoli, Cefalonia, Greece, January 1, 1889 – September 12, 1970, Paris) was a Greek-French art historian, critic, collector, writer and publisher. Better known as an art critic in his own ri ...

, "Entretien avec Étienne Bignou", ''Cahiers d'art'', 1927, n° 7-8, p. 1-2. * Ph. Mariot, "Plaques de verre photographiques provenant des archives d'Etienne Bignou", ''48/14. Revue du Musée d'Orsay'', 2007, n° 25, p. 79.

External links

Récupération artistique (MNR Rose-Valland)

Stolen, lost and missing drawings
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bignou, Étienne French art dealers

Biography

Nazi-looted art controversies

See also

Notes et references

Bibliography

External links