Gaston Hoffmann (1883-1977) - Disintegration

Gaston HOFFMANN
(Paris 1883 - Nice 1977)
Disintegration
Oil on canvas
H. 54 cm; L. 81 cm
Signed lower right

Provenance: Descendants of the artist.

Gaston Hoffmann's paintings are rarely seen, but never forgotten. Whether they exude a kind of burlesque poetry of the everyday, or reintroduce the surrealist spirit of Bosch or Brueghel in the midst of the modern period, they always emanate a unique euphoria, humor and inventiveness that give viewers a moment of happiness. Jean Veber, his predecessor at the Salon des Humoristes, was clearly one of his models. But his immense paintings, teeming with dozens of small comic characters, also evoke Devambez's transformation from miniature to gigantic...

It's all the more surprising to find such dark allegories in this cheerful master from Lorraine. To be astonished would be to forget that Hoffmann belongs to a generation whose flesh and soul were deeply scarred by the monstrous absurdity of the First World War. A time we naively hoped was finally over! Our painting, which certainly dates from the conflict or its immediate aftermath, is sufficiently eloquent to need no explanation. Let's just note that the artist did not resort to war reporting, like many of his contemporaries.

In this painting, which he entitled "Disintegration", Hoffmann chose the path of the fantastic, in the age-old tradition of visions of the Apocalypse. But this Death screaming out the end of the world, at the same time as emerging from a medieval danse macabre, prefigures the most modern means of destruction - with these fire-breathing globes seemingly endowed with nuclear power. These disturbing works - because their purpose is to remind us of the madness inherent in history, not to please us - deserve to feature in a timeless imagery of War, following in the footsteps of that other Lorraine artist, Jacques Callot. Perhaps the most extraordinary thing is that, having witnessed this darkness and extracted its pictorial essence, Gaston Hoffmann was able, throughout his career, to create some of the most joyous images imaginable!