Henryk Epstein (1891–1944), Landscape from Provence, 1938

Henri Epstein (1891–1944)
Title: Landscape from Provence
Medium: Watercolor on paper
Signature: “H. Epstein 1938”
Year: 1938
Dimensions: 47 x 61 cm (unframed), 62 x 76 cm (framed)
Provenance: Acquired directly from the artist; inherited by the current owner in France
Condition: very good

Henryk Epstein was born in 1891 in Łódź. In 1910, he began his studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich; from 1912, he studied in Paris at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. Initially, he was primarily interested in Post-Impressionism; later, he joined the circle of Fauvist painters. During World War I, he enlisted in the Polish military. After the war, he moved in the circles of Parisian avant-garde painters in Montparnasse, associated with the La Ruche art salon. He befriended, among others, Amedeo Modigliani, Chaim Soutine, and Marc Chagall. Henryk Epstein painted still lifes, nudes, figurative compositions, and landscapes. In France, he painted fishermen and their surroundings, harbors, as well as still lifes depicting seafood, fish, and birds. In the mid-1930s, he bought a farm near Épernon, where he often went to stay. Because of his Jewish heritage, he was arrested on February 23, 1944, and deported to the Drancy transit camp, from which his wife and daughter tried unsuccessfully to rescue him. On March 7, 1944, he was transported on Transport No. 69 to the Auschwitz camp, where he perished.