François-Joseph GUIGUET

In the words of a contemporary biographer of François Guiguet, ‘He used to say that the drawing is more than half the picture. When he spoke of the primacy of drawing his words came to life...Often, when he spoke of drawing, Guiguet’s hand came to life, making us understand that the line is a movement that we follow, almost involuntarily, by a more or less restrained gesture...You can place the drawings of Guiguet next to those by Ingres, Puvis and Ravier, they are at the same level, and the same is true of his painted works.’

This large self-portrait drawing has been dated to between 1890 and 1895 by Jean-Pierre Michel, the curator of the former Musée François Guiguet in Corbelin. The museum’s collection included two somewhat later painted self-portraits by the artist.