The Departmental Conservation of Gard presents rare and unpublished works at the Albert-André and sacred art museums. The exhibition, visible until May 4, 2025, traces the history of a collection born over the decades thanks to extraordinary personalities. A dive among the great names of the late 19th and 20th centuries.
A mask of a Tahitian woman by Gauguin, a Danaïde signed Rodin, a statue by Camille Claudel, drawings and sketches by Renoir, paintings by Marquet, Valtat, Signac… The exhibition “From Renoir to Van Dongen”, inaugurated in mid-December and presented until May 4, 2025, is exceptional in more than one way. Firstly because for the first time, an exhibition is common to the two sites which are the Albert-André museum in Bagnols and the secular museum of sacred art in Pont-Saint-Esprit, whose history is intimately linked to the personalities who are Albert André and his adopted daughter Jacqueline Bret-André. The exhibition thus traces the extraordinary history of successive donations which resulted in the creation of a collection of figurative paintings, from post-impressionism to the present day, of incredible richness.
A journey that retraces the history of the first provincial museum of modern art
Guided tour with Auréliane Vila-Drules, tour guide at the Departmental Conservation of Gard, which manages this collection, lively and fascinating narration and explanations. Visitors are delighted. There were around forty on Tuesday morning in Bagnols, around thirty on Friday in Pont-Saint-Esprit.
In Bagnols, on the second floor of the town hall, the route has been completely redesigned to present around a hundred works which had not or rarely been revealed to the public.
The exhibition is organized into four chapters, one for each personality who allowed the creation of the collections of the Bagnols museum, the first modern art museum in the province!
The first room is dedicated to Léon Alègre, the founding father of the museum, historian, archaeologist and recognized painter. We discover his drawings and prints of Bagnols, landscapes, “a very detailed, meticulous, realistic style”. Defender of popular education, he created a library-museum in 1857 which moved in 1868 to where it is located today. “At the time, it was an encyclopedic museum, with a room reserved for natural history, one for industry, one for agriculture…” Pieces from this first museum are thus highlighted, such as this Chinese moon-shaped lute.
Renoir invites Albert André to agree to become a curator
Albert André would become the museum’s curator in 1917.”He had inherited a house in Laudun where he spent his summers. One day, while he was shopping in Bagnols, the butcher asked him if he didn’t want to become the curator. Renoir said to him: “Accept, I will give you some paintings.” He will create a network, call on his friends, painters living in his time.” In the second room, works by Puvis de Chavannes, Signac…“After the fire of 1924, the municipality gave money which allowed Albert André to bring in 140 works, many small formats, he could not buy large canvases. There is still a Danaïde d’Auguste Rodin…” In the third room, “we find many drawings, engravings, watercolors, a wide variety of techniques, all figurative”. And portraits and a bust of Renoir, the “mentor of Albert André, a friendship was born between them. Albert André will be the godfather of Renoir’s last son and his executor. He will become friends with Jean Renoir who will bequeath him Renoir’s easel and palette”.
Jacqueline Bret-André continues and enriches the work of her adoptive father
In the next room, under the aegis of Jacqueline-Bret-André who became curator of the museum from 1958 to 1979, see numerous paintings by Albert André. “Jacqueline will continue the work of Albert André. We owe the transformation of the museum to her. She donates paintings every year, by her father and painters who are contemporaries.”
Finally, two rooms are dedicated to the important donation and legacy of George Besson, collector. “All his life, with his wife Adèle, he bought works. Here it’s a drawing by Rodin, here a caricature by Monet, there two watercolors by Signac…“George Besson and Albert André will become friends… The last room is thus richly furnished: The portrait of Adèle Besson by Kees van Dongen, a small portrait of George Besson by Matisse, inks by Marquet, and bouquets of flowers by Suzanne Valadon and Bonnard.
