The British island of Guernsey is arguably better known as an obscure tax haven for the super-rich than it is for its arts. But an upcoming traveling exhibit opening there this summer hopes to showcase another side to the island – as inspiration for French impressionist Pierre-Auguste Renoir.
The show Renoir in Guernsey, 1883 will focus on the 15 landscapes the artist painted during a five-week trip there, and for his stopover in Guernsey, his organisers, led by the charity Art for Guernsey, have obtained 12 of these works , including loans from the National Gallery in London (Bai du Moulin-Huet in Guernsey, 1883) and the Cincinnati Museum of Art (Fog in Guernsey, 1883) as well as from private collections, facilitated in part by Christie’s. One of the exhibited works, Guernsey rocks with figures (beach in Guernsey) (1883) was purchased at Christie’s London for £443,250 (with fees) by a group of local collectors including Art for Guernsey founder David Ummels in 2020.
First frame on the Renoir promenade showing the landscape that inspired the artist Baie du Moulin Huet through the trees (1883)
Courtesy of Art for Guernsey
Before being presented at the Candie Museum on the island (September 30-December 15), the exhibition will be inaugurated at the Musée des impressionnismes Giverny, France (July 14-September 10) whose reputation and link with the museum of Orsay also helped secure the loans. The exhibition was organized by the director of the Musée de Giverny, Cyrille Sciama, who has long supported Art For Guernsey. In 2019, he traveled to the island to record lectures on the artist’s connection to his landscape as part of the charity’s Renoir Walk programme. An initiative encouraging attendees to follow in the artist’s footsteps, he framed Guernsey’s remarkably unchanged landscape to match Renoir’s paintings and accompanied them on Sciama’s lectures.
Speaking of the importance of spectacle, Sciama says that Renoir’s time in Guernsey was integral to the artistic development of a bored and stagnant Renoir. “The exhibition is more than 15 paintings inspired by Guernsey. His time on the island gave him a sense of freedom that opened up his style.”
by Renoir Marine Guernsey (1883) will be returned to the heirs of Ambroise Vollard
© Wikimedia Commons
A painting that will be missing from the Guernsey stage of the exhibition is Marine Guernsey (1883). In February, the Musée d’Orsay is ordered by a Parisian administrative court to return the work to the heirs of the influential French merchant Ambroise Vollard. The painting was stolen during World War II and then sold to the Nazis. The painting was not planned for the Guernsey exhibition, although it was present during the Giverny stage. “Almost two years ago, the curator told us that [the painting] cannot leave French territory because a court decision was anticipated,” says Ummels.
The Candie exhibition will be part of a larger program celebrating the 140th anniversary of Renoir’s voyage. It will include shows and activities at the Priaulx Library, Renoir Promenade and the recently opened Art for Guernsey Gallery in the island’s Old Quarter. The new gallery will rotate art from local collectors, including works by Banksy, Thomas Gainsborough, Francisco de Goya, Andy Warhol and Renoir.
Art for Guernsey also runs a residency program allowing artists to produce works which are then exhibited in Guernsey. Nestled between the UK and France, Ummels cites the island’s unique position as an opportunity to build relationships with both countries. That’s the sentiment Sciama echoes. The importance of “tourism, culture and children” and the role of art in supporting everyone are at the heart of exchanges between the two territories. A ceremony at the town hall is planned this summer to officially recognize a partnership between the two localities, adds Sciama.
Of course, Giverny is already an art centre; which houses not only the Museum of Impressionism but also the Claude Monet Foundation, as well as the home of the artist and the inspiration for many of his masterpieces. But for Guernsey, Ummels recognizes the opportunity the exhibition – and its wider context – creates for a new brand image. “In the 19th century [Guernsey] was a destination for British and French artists to find inspiration.” Since then, the island has been in the business of granite, fruit, tourism and above all tax evasion, he continues. “I believe really to the island and to the people here,” says Ummels. “I think art has a role to play in reconnecting communities and giving us a chance to reintroduce ourselves to the UK, to France, to other countries and give them a chance to see who we are.”
