Paul Jouve

Jaguar Catching a Snake - Original etching

c. 1926

In the time when the School of Fine Arts and official or special academies promote the study of human model, Paul Jouve, influenced by his father, prominent landscape painter and portraitist, shows more interest in study of animal models. Since his childhood, his father took him to Paris museums and botanic gardens and to Jardin d’Acclimatation - he will keep coming back to them during his entire career - At the age of 16, simultaneously with his art studies Paul Jouve learns the art of gravure and the lithography at Henri Patrice Dillon He was then noticed by Renée Binet, the architect in charge for the construction of many buildings at Universal Exhibition in 1900, who for this occasion order from Jouve to make two groups of lions and to decorate the monumental gateway of one significant frieze in sandstone made by Alexandre Bigot. The support of the Gallery Bing where he exhibited his work in 1905 enables him to finance his travels to Europe and Algeria. Numerous journeys he undertook during his life thanks to awarded scholarships -Algeria, Equatorial, Africa or Far-East- or historical events, like those in Greece during the WWI, enabled him to record new terminology and numerous graphic and animaliers repertoires that his talent of drawer, illustrator, engraver and sculptor fantastically depicts. Paul Jouve exhibits in 1911 in the Gallery of Modern Artists, over one hundred thirty drawings and four sculptures. The press is unanimous and acknowledges the contained force and the architecture of his figures, constancy of his models and his precise meaning of forms ; Jouve’s eye sees beyond visible and catches what is sudden, fugitive, and sometimes silent ; the animal comes out from the lines of the drawing, he liked to say. The press, the critique and the collectors are also unanimous when in 1921 the Group of Four was created, gathering talents like Paul Jouve, Jean Goulden and François-Louis Schmied under the leadership of Jean Dunand. Every year until 1933, the group exhibited in the Gallery Georges Petit, different pieces like furniture, works of art, paintings, book covers and enamels. Simultaneously, Paul Jouve, now leader of the animaliers, exhibits with them regularly in the gallery Brandt. In 1929 it was renamed Gallery Malesherbes and later around 1933, it was taken over by Edouard-Marcel Sandoz. After the war the group exhibited in the gallery Art vivant and finally, from 1948 to 1957, in circle Volney, also purchased by Sandoz. Jouve’s career is marked by prestigious orders, such as Ocean liner Normandie in 1935, and the literary work he will illustrate during his career, such as Jungle book by Kypling in 1919. In years after the WWII some beautiful retrospectives of his work took place. All his life he dedicated his multiple talent to animal, drawn and statuary character of his work, without ever betraying or leaving his virtuosity. Being a great traveler, from Bedouin tents to Angkor, he gave to his work an incomparable and unique diversity made of light, architecture, expressions and imagination.