I recently bought a painting by painter Andre Vidal born in Algeria in
1913.  The painting appears to be to be an impressionist style
landscape oil which looks like Southern France or Spain countryside. I
know two of his painting were auctioned in France within the last 2 or
3 years.

I would like to know as much about his life, travels, and name as an
artist as possible.  I would also like to know the origin of his
parents if possible.

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Request for Question Clarification by jeanluis-ga on 13 Jun 2002 14:48 PDT

Whew this is a toughie (for people who only speak English anyway), is
there any other info you can give, such as the names of some of his
paintings. Or any other small detail that might open a door for me?

Hello dedemore

At last I've found you some information although it is not as much as
you (and I) hoped and raises a whole new set of questions.  I guess
since you own a painting of Vidal's you would like to find out
anything you can.

Vidal was born in Algiers, capital of Algeria on April 13, in 1913 as
you said.

He was an "eleve des Ateliers d'art de la Ville de Paris".  This
translates as a student at the art studios of the city of Paris and
implies he learnt through apprenticeship and associating with other
artists.  At first I thought this might be the name of an art school
(because of the capital letters) but I can find no trace of any
institution with that name.  I guess the capital letters were an
editing error.

As well as painting he worked as a journalist and art critic.

You asked about his parents.  The one thing we can tell about them is
that one at least must have been Jewish.
 
At one time Andre Vidal was President of the "Association des
Artistes-peintres et Sculpteurs Juifs de France", an organisation for
Jewish artists in France.  This proved, disappointingly, to be a dead
end and I could find out nothing more about the association except the
names of two other 20c presidents:  Francis Harburger and Raphael
Pricert.

Vidal exhibited at a Jewish cultural center in Paris, the "Centre
Culturel Juif de Paris".

I think this Jewish connection might explain a little about the only
painting of his I could find a name for.  On 9 December 1996 his
"Procession macedoine a Buf pres de Florina 1919" sold in Paris for
18000 francs.  (Macedonian procession at Buf, near Florina 1919)  This
picture measures 50 by 61.5 cms.

Before the second world war there was a thriving Jewish community in
Macedonia and I speculate that he would have an interest in the
subject matter for that reason.  But could he ever have been there? 
If he was there in 1919 he was a small boy, of course.

I have managed to establish that Florina is a real village on the
Greek side of the Greece-Macedonia border and that Buf is also a real
place that has been re-named Akrita.  But no trace of Vidal.

While trying to investigate Jewish painters in Paris I came across the
following entry in the catalog of the national library (Bibiliotheque
Nationale Francaise)

Nieszawer, Nadine
Peintres juifs à Paris, 1905-1939 : École de Paris / Nadine Nieszawer,
Marie Boyé, Paul Fogel ; préf. de Claude Lanzmann. - Paris : Denoël,
2000 (85-Luçon : Impr. Pollina). - 365 p. : ill. en noir et en coul.,
couv. ill. en coul. ; 24 cm.
Notes bibliogr. Index. - DL 01-25414 (D4). - 759.436 10904 + 709.224
4361. - ISBN 2-207-25142-X (br.) : 280 F.
Peintres juifs -- France -- Paris (France) -- 1900-1945
Peintres juifs -- Biographies -- Dictionnaires
École de Paris
BN 02647509 
01-26475 


This 365 page illustrated book on Jewish Painters in Paris between
1905 and 1939 is available from the French branch of Amazon for 41
Euros plus shipping:
http://www.amazon.fr/exec/obidos/ASIN/220725142X/qid%3D1026403554/171-5744485-2221803

It has information on 150 painters but of course we don't know if it
mentions Vidal!


If you wanted to contact the publisher to inquire about which painters
are included their address is:

ÉDITIONS DENOËL
9, RUE DU CHERCHE-MIDI
75278 PARIS CEDEX 06
TEL. (33) 1.44397373 - FAX (33) 1.44397390 

I do hope you are either able to be content with these bits and pieces
or are able to follow it up more offline.  But thank-you for giving me
the opportunity to work on this puzzle.








The biographical information came from:
Dictionnaire Critique et Documentaire des Peintres, Sculpters,
Dessinateurs et Graveurs, by E. Benezit.  Gruend (1999)

I then tried to follow it up with searches using combinations of these
words:

"centre culturel juif" "association artistes juifs" Paris France


TheFrench national Library catalog entry came from:
http://bibliographienationale.bnf.fr/Livres/M13_01.H/cadre75-1.html

Denoel publishers address from:
http://www.gallimard.fr/web/gallimard/catalog/maisons/denoel/presentation.html

Other presidents of the Jewish Artists Association:
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22association+des+artistes+peintres+et+sculpteurs++juifs+de+france%22&btnG=Google+Search

When I was chasing the Macedonian connection I used search terms: 
Macedonia Jew procession Florina Buf


You would find more on Jews in Macedonia at:
http://www.ce-review.org/00/4/daskalovski4.html

and on the village names in the title of the painting at:
http://geneamac.dhs.org/reference/VillageNames.php3

Apologies for the lack of accents on the French words - something is
not working for me.

---

Clarification of Answer by leli-ga on 11 Jul 2002 09:59 PDT

Forgot to include atelier d'art and "ateliers d'art de la ville de
Paris" in my description of the search process

A "heads up" on the difficulty of this question (and if it were easy,
why ask, right?). I looked in National Library Catalogs for the United
States and France and could only find a possibility that an Andre
Vidal who writes on management topics might have been born in 1913 and
could have moonlighted as an author (though I didn't get any
indications as to this - a shot in the dark). The idea would be, then,
to get a book by this Vidal and hope for biographical information on
the flyleaf or in an introduction.

I also checked the provenance catalogues via the Getty Institute and
found nothing on any paintings by Andre Vidal.

A possibility is that there is a variation on the first name (Andres?
Andreu?).

Most likely is he's just a minor artist (which doesn't mean he's a bad
one at all) and information about him would only be available in local
Algerian and French print resources. Understand that there are few
newspaper indexes in print in ANY language that predate the late
1970's.

I hope someone gets you an answer (and I will be VERY impressed - as
should you - if they do!).

Good luck!

fugitive-ga

Look in Benezit.

Benezit, a Dictionary of Artists: http://books-on-art.com/bzit99e.html

The most recent copy of Benezit to be found in my neck of the woods is
a 1966 edition, and Vidal's not in it.  Since Benezit only records
info on artists who have died, and Vidal was born in 1913, it is quite
possible that he's not yet in the most recent edition (lots of people
live to be 88).