Etienne-Prosper BERNE-BELLECOUR - Portrait of Major Doctor Daymard

Etienne-Prosper BERNE-BELLECOUR
Boulogne-sur-mer, 1838 – Paris, 1910
Oil on canvas
46 x 33 cm (55 x 43 cm with the frame)
Signed lower right "To doctor Daymard / His friend / E. Berne-Bellecour 1903"
Painting exhibited at the Salon of French Artists in 1904 (number 136. “Portrait of M. le Médecin-Major Daymard”)

An academic painter, Berne-Bellecour worked for illustrated newspapers after failing at the Prix de Rome in 1859.
In 1870, he joined the Free Corps of Tirailleurs de la Seine and was awarded the Military Medal. This will decide his career. Companion of Édouard Detaille and Alphonse de Neuville, he painted battle paintings and portraits of soldiers that made him successful. The Tirailleurs de la Seine in combat at Malmaison (1874), The Prisoner and The Defense of a Bridge are among his most famous paintings.

Our painting was exhibited at the Paris Salon in 1904 under the title “Portrait of M. le Médecin-Major Daymard”. Léon Daymard, originally from Cahors like his brother who was chairman of Crédit Foncier, was a famous military doctor. Active from the 1870 war until 1903, he took part in seven military campaigns and followed the French armies into the colonies.
The finished quality of Berne-Bellecour's painting is all the more remarkable in his military portraits like here. He also represented a beautiful landscape in the background, probably in the North African colonies. Because in 1903 the French army is active in North Africa from Egypt to Morocco to defend its colonies against England and Germany.

Ref: ZBWCRKD06T