TODAY IS THE FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF COROT'S DEATH

M. Théodore Duret, who knew the great artist well, tells us some amusing memories of the painter and friend.
Today will be fifty years since Corot died, the admirable painter, so long unknown during his lifetime and whose works today fill museums and great collections throughout the world. He was leaving laden with years, he was almost eighty years old, laden with crowns too, because the owner of an honest fortune inherited from his family, he had ended up increasing it considerably, thanks to the proceeds of his paintings which, for some years, had been selling at high prices for the time, from 2,000 to 3,000 francs.
A man who knew Corot very well and who has kept a delightful memory of him, Mr. Théodore Duret, also esteemed for his masterly studies on Manet, on Van Gogh, on the Impressionists, and for important historical works, wanted to talk to us about the master of Ville-d'Avray.

Corot, this good, this charming Corot, that takes us far, he tells us in the first words, I met him in 1852. I was then very young and I have just turned eighty-eight.

And, as we compliment him on his astonishing vigor and his good looks, he adds with a smile:

Corot and Courbet

In my family, it is a tradition to live a long time. My father died at ninety-two and my grandfather at over ninety-nine. But let us return to Corot. I met him for the first time in Saintes, my native country, where Courbet was staying at the time, staying with a friend, Mr. Baudry. Corot had just arrived from La Rochelle, where he had painted a view of the port, which was exhibited at the Salon that same year. As for Courbet, he had just completed a masterpiece, the portrait of a lady B.

Corot and Courbet knew each other and appreciated each other at their true value. Despite his famous quip: "Corot. ah! who, the one who always makes the same nymphs dance in the same landscapes!" Courbet admired in Corot the qualities that he might lack, or that he knew he possessed to a lesser degree. For the same reason Corot admired his rival, to whom very few painters of the time did justice.

Two different beings

And Mr. Théodore Durêt draws for us the portrait of each of the two artists. It was impossible to see two more different beings. Courbet was tall, strong, stocky, bearded like a river divinity. Expansive and a great talker, he was also afflicted with boundless vanity. Corot, on the contrary, was thin and nervous. was discretion and modesty itself. No one knew how to listen with indulgence like him. This is perhaps why he got on with Corot. The latter, however, whatever his good nature, was not lacking in mischief and knew his world.
One day, in Saintes, he was dining at the same table as Courbet. We manage, of course, to talk about painting. Painters, Courbet exclaims, but there aren't any, there aren't any more, except me...
Then, sensing all the same that Corot is there, he hastens to add: And Corot... When he went out with M. Théodore Duret. who was at the dinner, Corot could not help but make this remark with a laugh: "Courbet was very good to me. He named me after him. If I had not been there, he would have named himself, be sure of it." This is because Courbet did not readily admit his real admiration for Corot. while Corot did not fear to display his for Courbet, then as little known as he. Did he not sell the Studio for a paltry three thousand francs, which the Louvre was later to pay five hundred thousand francs for?

Despite their difference in temperament and by the law of contrasts, the two artists loved each other. M. Duret surprised them one day, painting next to each other, at the end of the road leading to Saint-Jean-d'Angély and from where one can see a marvelous panoramic view of Saintes.

A Modest

At that time, Corot, in terms of financial success, was no less mistreated than his rival. Although Gustave Planche, Thoré, Silvestre, Théophile Gautier had already proclaimed the beauty and poetry of his work, Corot still sold his paintings at ridiculous prices. But, not being a poor man, he remained indifferent to these material contingencies, just as, in his simplicity and entirely devoted to his artist's dream, he had a sovereign disdain for publicity. This did not favor him with art lovers and, when M. Théodore Duret prophesied that a day would come when a Corot worth 80,000 francs would be a cheap Corot, people laughed until they twisted.
This is because the great man was divinely modest. If someone said to him: "I saw a painting of yours that is very beautiful," he would reply: "Do you really think so? You please me." At the time of his obscurity. He willingly gave his paintings as gifts to his friends, even to the friends of his friends. Having become famous, he was no less generous. Every year, he would spend a few weeks in Rosny-sur-Seine, at the home of an old friend of his family, Mrs. Osmond. At her request, he donated to his family's church his painting, the Flight into Egypt (his Salon of 1840), and later, still free of charge, he painted for the humble church an entire Stations of the Cross. In Mantes, at the home of a notary with whom he was connected, workmen were painting a bathroom. Watching them work, Corot was suddenly seized with the idea of ​​replacing them and he decorated, for his own pleasure, the three walls of the room. In Ville-d'Avray, he was to paint four scenes from the Bible on the walls of the church later and under the same conditions. As for his kindness, you know so many things about it, as everyone else; from the purchase of Daumier's house in Antwerp to give it to him; fake paintings, bearing his signature imitated, retouched by him, so that poor devils could sell them, etc. Ah! the good man and that we are therefore right to celebrate his memory!"
With these words, we take leave of Mr. Théodore Duret, not without admiring his living full-length portrait by Van Dongen. It is beautiful for an octogenarian to have followed his time to the point of consenting to serve as a model for an avant-garde artist.