Updated 02 February 2024
Currently not on display
Currently not on display
Forest in Autumn
| Materials and Techniques | oil on canvas |
|---|---|
| Size（cm） | 85.5 x 123 |
| Inscriptions | Signed lower right: E. R. Ménard |
| Credit Line | Matsukata Collection |
| Standard ref. | M740 |
| Category | Paintings |
| Collection Number | P.1959-0141 |
Raised in the intellectual family of an art historian, Ménard was influenced by the Barbizon painters who visited his father. His works began to show a strong symbolist tendency after his studies at the Academy. He painted a great number of pictures of people in antique costumes standing by lakes and trees, so-called historical landscapes, in which a mysterious harmony between man and nature was suggestively rendered. The symbolic elements in this work depicting deer in the countryside can be found in the twilight sky and autumnal season. (Source: Masterpieces of the National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, 2009, cat. no. 104)
Provenance
Purchased by Kojiro Matsukata, Kobe through Léonce Bénédite, ca. January 1919 (Fr. 8,000) [see letter from Léonce Bénédite to Suzuki & Co., dated 19 January 1919, in the Bibliothèque centrale des musées nationaux, Paris (copy in NMWA curatorial file)]; sequestered by French government, 1944; vested in French government under San Francisco Peace Treaty, 1952; transferred from French to Japanese government, 23 January 1959; entered into NMWA, April 1959.
Exhibition History
- 1989
- The French Modern Painting, from the National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, Miyakonojo City Museum, 15 April 1989 - 14 May 1989, cat. no. 15, repr.
Bibliography
- 1961
- Catalogue du Musée National d'Art Occidental, Tokyo. Tokyo, The National Museum of Western Art, 1961 (Préface and Catalogue Général in Japanese and French), P-197.
- 1979
- The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo: Catalogue of Paintings. Tokyo, The National Museum of Western Art, 1979, no. 179, repr.
- 1990
- The Old Matsukata Collection. Kobe City Museum, ed. Kobe, "Matsukata Korekushon Ten" Jikkoiinkai, 1990, cat. no. 1021.
- 2006
- Masterpieces of The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo. Tokyo, The National Museum of Western Art; Tokyo, The Western Art Foundation, 2006 (Japanese, preface in Japanese and English), no. 104, col. repr.
- 2009
- Masterpieces of The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo. Tokyo, The National Museum of Western Art; Tokyo, The Western Art Foundation, 2009, no. 104, col. repr.
- 2018
- The Matsukata Collection: Complete Catalogue of the European Art. Kawaguchi, Masako; Jingaoka, Megumi, eds. vol. 1: Paintings, Tokyo, The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, 2018, cat. no. 740, col. repr.