Pastel, Collioure, 1928 - Achille Laugé (1861-1944)

Achille LAUGE 1861-1944

Born into a farming family, he studied at the Beaux-Arts in Toulouse, while training to become a pharmacist.
He abandoned his parents' wishes to devote himself entirely to art, entering the Beaux-arts de Paris in 1882.
In the city of modernism, he rubbed shoulders with sculptor Bourdelle and painters Pissarro, Signac and Seurat.
It was under their influence that he adopted the color division that would lead to pointillism.

Color division:
Colors are no longer mixed on the palette, but placed pure on the canvas in tiny, separate strokes, creating magic in the viewer's eye.
In 1888, Laugé returned to his village, and there, alone, he let his interpretation of this theory express itself.
During this period, he placed great importance on portraits of his family. His works show a fine colorist's technique and a great talent for drawing.

Laugé quickly developed works that were both inspired by his time and innovative.
Some of his floral works are inspired by Japonism. Simple compositions, with fine, delicate colors and pure lines, a personal synthesis of the masters of printmaking.
From 1900 onwards, Laugé intensified his use of color. This last trend is related to the development of Fauvism.
At the same time, he distinguished himself by the geometrization of his landscapes, in stark contrast to the sinuosity of Art Nouveau.

Landscapes
The artist devoted much of his career to landscapes.
Two places recur frequently in his work:
The villages of the Aude region, where he was born, and Collioure, a small port in the south of France.
In 1905, Laugé built himself a studio caravan to work in the open air. This enabled him to paint everywhere, summer and winter alike, and to devote himself to numerous studies and variations on life, freeing his brushstrokes.

Collioure is a small village in southwest France. Henri Matisse, soon joined by André Derain, fell under the spell of Collioure in the summer of 1905.
Using "colors out of the tube", the two artists concentrated their palette on pure, vivid tones - thus laying the foundations for Fauvism. The Catalan port then welcomed other painters; seduced by the exceptional site, they liked to meet at the Templiers bar. Among them was Achille Laugé,

During the years 1926-1930, Achille painted Collioure many times, often in pastels.
These pastels play with light colors to capture the warm atmosphere of the southern village.

The composition, constructed in broad lines, shows the famous round tower, adjacent to the church of Notre-Dame des Anges, towering over the sea like a sentinel, watching over the comings and goings of the sea.
In contrast to his pointillist canvases, Laugé's pastels are much freer and less codified. You can see the wild grasses in the stones and th