Auguste Chauvin

Auguste Chauvin was born in Liège, Chauvin moved with his family to Aachen in 1816. He trained initially as an architect while learning the basics of drawing and painting from Jean Baptiste Bastiné. After working as a master mason for several years, he abandoned that career in 1831 to study at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf under Wilhelm von Schadow. From 1832 to 1841 he continued his training in Düsseldorf while spending several months each year as court painter to the prince of Neuwied. In 1841 Chauvin returned to Liège, where he was offered a teaching post at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts. He became its director in 1856 and also was director of the city's painting collections. He retired in 1880. Throughout his career he worked to promote German art, particularly the Düsseldorf masters, in Belgium.

Auguste Chauvin studied at Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. Training under Friedrich Wilhelm Schadow and Jean Baptiste Bastiné is recorded. The recorded working language is French. Subjects and genres recorded for the work are religious, portrait and history. The authority associates the name with Düsseldorf school of painting and Nazarene movement. Places of work recorded in the authority are Neuwied and Liège. Employment is recorded with Royal Academy of Arts of Liège. Positions recorded include Director of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Liège and teacher. Works named in the authority record are Le Banquet de Jupille, Farewell between Tobias and his blind Father, Portrait of father Henri Lacordaire, A final meeting of the mayors Beeckman and Laruelle, Portrait of the Baron Louis de Schiervel and Portrait of Louis Jamme. Work by Auguste Chauvin is recorded in the collections of Liege Fine Arts Museum, Museum Kunstpalast and Musée de l'Art wallon. Distinctions recorded are Knight of the Order of Leopold.

• Name — Auguste Chauvin • Birth Name — Auguste Adolphe Chauvin • Born — 24 October 1810 • Birthplace — Liège, France • Died — 29 May 1884 • Place of death — Liège, Belgium • Education — Jean Baptiste Bastiné; Kunstakademie Düsseldorf under Wilhelm von Schadow • Occupation — Painter, art teacher, museum director • Known for — History painting, religious scenes, portraits • Notable Works — The Flight into Egypt (1848) Portrait of Father Henri Lacordaire (1848) The Banquet of Jupille (1861) • Awards — Vermeil medal, 1848 Brussels Salon; Knight, Order of Leopold (1861)

Auguste Adolphe Chauvin was born on 24 October 1810 in Liège, then part of the French Empire. He was the eldest son of Pierre Jean Jacques Chauvin, a hat merchant, and Antoinette Piermont. The couple had several other children, including François Chauvin (born 1812), who became an officer in the German army and was ennobled after the wars of 1866 and 1870. In 1816 the family moved to Aachen, where Auguste attended primary school, secondary school, and finally industrial school. He was soon attached to the latter institution as a substitute teacher. Around this time he began studying the principles of drawing and painting alongside Alfred Rethel under Jean Baptiste Bastiné. He trained as an architect and for four or five years worked as a Maurermeister (master mason). The work did not suit him, and in 1831 he decided to go to Düsseldorf to study at the Academy of Fine Arts under Wilhelm von Schadow. According to an 1865 article in La Meuse, "Schadow pulled a rather doubtful face when he heard the plans laid out by this young man of twenty-one; and he forcefully objected to the difficulties of his undertaking; nevertheless, yielding to this firm and unshakeable will, he allowed him to make a trial." Chauvin continued his training at the Düsseldorf Academy, but was obliged each year to leave the city for several months to go to Neuwied. From 1832 to 1841 he worked there as drawing master to Prince Maximilian zu Wied-Neuwied and later as official court painter. There, "he later told his pupils, he painted in white gloves". • Illustration — Farewell between Tobias and His Blind Father, 1836 (oil on canvas; 159 × 131.5 cm), Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf Chauvin began his artistic career in 1836 with the canvas Farewell between Tobias and His Blind Father. In 1840 he exhibited two paintings at the Antwerp Salon, including The Châtelaine; Episode of the Falcon Hunt. "This work was so successful that soon other artists seized on the subject and reproduced it with different variations." During his years in Düsseldorf, Chauvin formed friendships with Alfred Rethel and Christian Köhler. He also organised a trip to Belgium, serving as guide for Schadow, Köhler, and fourteen other painters of the Düsseldorf school. "This was the first important artistic journey, which created relations between Belgian and German artists, even though the latter felt themselves more drawn to the works of the old masters of Ghent, Antwerp and Bruges." He married Marie Wilhelmine Buschbeck (1819–1890), a native of Koblenz, with whom he had five sons, including the University of Liège professor and orientalist Victor Chauvin (1844–1913).

In 1841 Chauvin returned to Liège, where he was appointed professor of drawing at the Academy of Fine Arts. This began a teaching career that extended from 1842 to 1880. In 1855 he was appointed director of the Academy following the death of Barthélemy Vieillevoye, and held both posts from 1856 to 1880. As professor and director he brought "an elevated spirit, a sound judgment, a sure taste, and great benevolence towards his pupils and subordinates". He was also credited with "the necessary tact to direct each person in his path" and the ability to "encourage talent appropriately and give it the opportunity to emerge". In addition to his Academy career, Chauvin served on the governing committee of the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts from 1846 to 1857, the Provincial Monuments Commission, and the Commission for the Improvement of Drawing Instruction. In 1856 he was also named director of the city of Liège's painting collections, then housed in the Halle aux Drapiers, a position he likewise held until 1880. • Illustration — A Last Meeting between the Mayors Beeckman and Laruelle, c. 1848 (oil on canvas; 275 × 207 cm), Museum of Walloon Art, Liège Despite his multiple teaching and administrative duties, Chauvin exhibited regularly. At the 1845 Brussels Salon he showed The Death of Moses. In 1848 he sent five works to the Brussels Salon, including A Last Meeting between the Mayors Beeckman and Laruelle, which earned him a vermeil medal, his Flight into Egypt which "was so successful and was reproduced by engraving", and his Portrait of Father Henri Lacordaire. Critics were guarded, however, finding in the artist "unquestionable qualities, compressed by an excess of wisdom, of prudence" and urging him "to be bolder; let him not fear to show too much audacity". At the 1851 Brussels Salon, Chauvin exhibited the Portrait of Baron Louis de Schiervel, held at the Senate. The same year he took part in the annual exhibition of the Royal Academy of Arts in London, sending three canvases including The Flight into Egypt. • Illustration — Portrait of Baron Louis de Schiervel, c. 1851 (oil on canvas; 117 × 95 cm), Belgian Senate, Brussels Chauvin's next exhibition was not until ten years later, when he showed The Banquet of Jupille at the 1861 Antwerp Salon. The absence of notable exhibitions during this period was probably linked to his increased workload at the Academy following the death of Barthélemy Vieillevoye in 1855. In 1855–56 he had been named director of the Academy (initially in an acting capacity until 1858, then permanently) and of the municipal art collections, while also serving as professor of drawing "from nature", painting, and historical composition (advanced teaching). He also continued to teach the intermediate courses in drawing "from the antique" and expression, which he had handled since 1842, until he was finally replaced in September 1859 by Charles Soubre. Chauvin's return to exhibiting was well received by contemporary critics, and he was made a Knight of the Order of Leopold at the close of the Salon. The Banquet of Jupille met with "such legitimate success" at the Antwerp Salon that the following year "the Senate of Berlin sent the artist a most flattering letter inviting him to exhibit" the painting in the Prussian capital, where it was also well received by the critics. In the years that followed, Chauvin exhibited more regularly: at the London International Exhibition in 1862; at the Antwerp Salon in 1864, 1870, and 1873; at the Ghent Salon in 1871 and 1874; and finally at the 1875 Brussels Salon. Most of the works he sent were religious paintings, such as The Remorse of Cain, The Arrival of the Holy Family in Egypt, and The Education of the Virgin Mary. Nevertheless, Chauvin's artistic output had slowed—a point the periodical Le Rasoir lamented in an article of 6 April 1873: For some time, however, the artist seems to have been absorbed by the director of the Academy; the colours are drying on his palette and his brush seems neglected. Has the sacred fire gone out and does the artist think to rest on his successes? • Illustration — Victor Lemaître, Auguste Chauvin, Director of the Academy of Fine Arts of Liège, 6 April 1873 (caricature from Le Rasoir no. 94) In 1930 the art critic and museum curator Jules Bosmant described Chauvin as an "erudite and much listened-to man [who] enjoyed great prestige in Liège", a judgement already conveyed by an 1865 article in La Meuse: "His talent, his wit, his knowledge, and his activity have earned him the esteem of his fellow citizens and the confidence of the government, which often calls him to serve on commissions or charges him with missions abroad." In 1863 he was sent to Stuttgart and Munich "to report on the exhibition of graphic works from the Bavarian schools". Throughout his career he "strove to make German art, and more particularly the works of the Düsseldorf masters, known and appreciated in Belgium". From the German side, the artist and critic Ernst Förster, quoted by Johannes Fey in 1897, considered that Chauvin "combines in the most agreeable manner German conviviality with French liveliness and lightness". The "German conviviality" was found especially in Chauvin's family life, while the "French liveliness and lightness" manifested more in his public activity.

In 1880 Chauvin retired, his departure announced in June and made official in October, "after long and loyal service". He was also named honorary director. Even in retirement, he sent Moses on Mount Sinai to the 1880 Ghent Salon and presented three canvases at the Historical Exhibition of Belgian Art 1830–1880 in Brussels. The same year he wrote a study of Liège painters since 1830 (published in 1881), noting that an album presented to the German Empress Augusta of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach contained a drawing by his hand; and produced portraits of Joseph Lebeau (a government commission) and of Hippolyte Cornet, former mayor of Chênée. Auguste Chauvin died in Liège on 29 May 1884 from an illness that had struck him shortly before, as Prosper Drion recalled at the funeral: "Scarcely a month ago he took to his bed, never to rise again, and yesterday, still alive in spirit, he passed away without suffering." The funeral drew "a considerable crowd", including numerous "Liège notables" as well as "the teaching staff and the students of the Academy in full force". He was buried in Robermont Cemetery.

The subject of this oil painting is Jean-Baptiste-Henri Lacordaire, the celebrated French preacher who in 1847 stayed in Liège, at whose cathedral he gave a series of lectures between 21 February and 20 April as part of Lent. He came with the aim of "preparing souls for Faith, because Faith is the principle of Hope and Charity". Lacordaire's lectures and discourses were received enthusiastically by the people of Liège, so much so that he also gave lectures at the Société libre d'émulation, where he was named an honorary member, was awarded an honorary doctorate in philosophy by the University of Liège, and where subscriptions were collected to "immortalise his passage through Liège". Chauvin was chosen to produce the portrait, and he depicted the clergyman seated in a room with a window in the background showing the bell tower of Saint Paul's Cathedral. The work was one of the five paintings Chauvin presented at the 1848 Brussels Salon. Although the critics of the Revue du Salon de Bruxelles praised certain aspects of the canvas—the drawing was "correct as in most of the Liège artist's compositions" and the portrait overall showed harmony—they nevertheless felt that Chauvin had painted a portrait of the "celebrated preacher, minus his genius", for "the high intelligence of the eloquent Dominican cannot be guessed at in the painting". The work is currently held by the Bishopric of Liège.

Also known as Saint Lambert at the Banquet of Pepin of Herstal, The Banquet of Jupille, a monumental canvas completed in 1861 and part of the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, is exhibited at Saint Paul's Cathedral in Liège. It was presented there on 5 September 1996 as part of the commemorations of the 13th centenary of Saint Lambert's death, after a restoration begun in April 1996. • Illustration — Study for 'The Banquet of Jupille, 1856 (oil on canvas), Herstal, municipal museum The work was commissioned from Chauvin by the Belgian state and the city of Liège, under a contract signed on 1 May 1855 stipulating that "M. Chauvin undertakes to execute a painting representing a fact drawn from the annals of the country, whose subject and dimensions shall be duly approved" and that the total price was fixed at 10,000 Belgian francs. The composition was developed from 1855 to 1861, and although Chauvin quickly determined the subject, delays in its execution were "due to the artist's illness and above all to his dual functions as director of the Academy and acting professor of the drawing-from-the-antique class". Once completed, the work was exhibited at the Antwerp Salon and in December 1861 was installed at the municipal museum of Liège, where "the College, highly satisfied, congratulated the artist". The painting depicts the following scene: "Saint Lambert, standing, addresses Alpaïde and Pepin; the former, because by mingling her cup with those of the other guests to have it blessed, she sought to surprise the good faith of the bishop; the latter, because having Alpaïde at his side, in place of his lawful wife Plectrude, he defies the laws and the prohibition of the Church." • Illustration — The Banquet of Jupille, 1861 (oil on canvas; 390 × 470 cm), Liège, Saint Paul's Cathedral According to Philippe George and Jean-Louis Kupper, this historical composition must "be placed within a current that has expressed itself since the Belgian Revolution, that of monumental painting aimed at awakening, consolidating, and sustaining national and patriotic sentiment among the Belgian population." In a similar vein, the art historian Judith Ogonovszky-Steffens observes that a monumental painting was often created for "emblematic seats of power" such as the Chamber, the Senate, palaces of justice, or city halls, and served to "legitimise the existence of the young kingdom of Belgium" and to "instil a national sentiment". In this case, the painting references "two justificatory sources for the Belgium of 1830: the Catholic religion and the national past". Saint Lambert acts as "defender of the sacrament of marriage" and thus of Christian moral values, but he also represents "a nod to the principality era", and hence a reference to that national past. The allusion to the national past is completed by the use of "the Pippinid and Carolingian imaginary", evoked "with Pepin of 'Herstal' in his 'palace' of 'Jupille', not forgetting the young Charles Martel represented by Chauvin beside his parents." The Journal des beaux-arts of 15 September 1861 published an enthusiastic review of the work, then exhibited at the Antwerp Salon: Twentieth-century critics were less unanimous. Jules Bosmant commented in 1930 that the painting "presents, in a deplorable colour, a gesticulation of tragic actors who pose for the lens and concern themselves more with displaying the nobility of their attitudes and the harmony of their grimaces than with the vehement truth of the sentiments they feel." Jacques Hendrick found it "of a glacial coldness of execution and sentiment". When the restored work was presented at Saint Paul's Cathedral in 1996, Philippe George, conservator of the cathedral treasury, noted that Chauvin "took care with his setting" and "individualised each character, faithful to his speciality as a portraitist". He also observed that "an extreme dramatisation can be read in the expression of the faces and the gaze of the characters" and detected "references to older painting": for example to The Wedding at Cana or The Feast in the House of Levi by Veronese for the composition, or to Botticelli, Raphael, or Italian 16th-century Mannerism for the faces and female figures. More anecdotally, he hypothesised that "the man just behind Saint Lambert, moustachioed and bearded, with wavy hair and a very distinctive nose, could be a self-portrait" of the painter.

• Illustration — The Repose of Cain, 1847 (oil on panel; 31.5 × 36 cm), private collection • Illustration — Portrait of a Gentleman, 1855 (oil on canvas; 124 × 91 cm), private collection • Illustration — Portrait of a Noblewoman, 1855 (oil on canvas; 124 × 91 cm), private collection • Illustration — Portrait of Coraline, 1868 (oil on canvas; 91 × 68 cm), private collection • Illustration — Portrait of a Woman, 1877 (oil on canvas; 62 × 55 cm), private collection

Chauvin exhibited on several occasions in Prussia, notably in Berlin in 1836, 1838, and 1862. • 1840: Antwerp Salon, 1 August – 15 September, rue Vénus, Antwerp (two canvases: The Châtelaine; Episode of the Falcon Hunt and Portrait of a Man). • 1845: Brussels Salon, 15 August – 6 October, former apartments of the Palace of Charles of Lorraine, Brussels (The Death of Moses). • Illustration — Reproduction of The Flight into Egypt, 1851 (41.8 × 54.5 cm), Wallraf-Richartz Museum, Cologne • 1848: Brussels Salon, 16 August – 2 October, former apartments of the Palace of Charles of Lorraine, Brussels (five paintings: The Prayer of Moses, The Flight into Egypt, Judas, A Last Meeting between the Mayors Beeckman and Laruelle, and Portrait of Father Henri Lacordaire). • 1851: Brussels Salon, 15 August – 31 October, former apartments of the Palace of Charles of Lorraine, Brussels (Portrait of Baron Louis de Schiervel); The Exhibition of the Royal Academy of Arts, Royal Academy, London (The Holy Women, The Flight into Egypt, and The Wise Men of the East). • 1861: Antwerp Salon, 4 August – 30 September, rue Vénus, Antwerp (The Banquet of Jupille). • 1862: London International Exhibition, 1 May – 1 November. • 1864: Antwerp Salon, 7 August – 2 October, rue Vénus, Antwerp (The Remorse of Cain). • 1870: Antwerp Salon, 14 August – 2 October, rue Vénus, Antwerp (The Arrival of the Holy Family in Egypt). • 1871: 28th National and Triennial Exhibition – Ghent Salon, 10 September – 14 November, Casino, Ghent (The Education of the Virgin Mary). • 1873: Antwerp Salon, 10 August – 5 October, rue Vénus, Antwerp (two works: The Adoration of the Shepherd Children and The Education of the Virgin Mary). • 1874: 29th Triennial Exhibition – Ghent Salon, 30 August – 18 October, Casino, Ghent (Young Girl at Her Toilette). • 1875: Brussels Salon, 23 August – 15 November, Place du Petit Sablon, Brussels (Judas Iscariot). • 1880: 31st Triennial Exhibition – Ghent Salon, 15 August – 2 November, Casino, Ghent (Moses on Mount Sinai); Artistic Circle Festival, August, Artistic and Literary Circle of Brussels (Portrait of Joseph Lebeau); Historical Exhibition of Belgian Art 1830–1880, 1 August – 31 October, Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, Brussels (Judas Iscariot, A Last Meeting between the Mayors Beeckman and Laruelle, and Portrait of Louis Jamme).

• 1895: Inaugural Exhibition of the Academy of Fine Arts (organised by the Royal Circle of Fine Arts for the inauguration of the new buildings of the Académie royale des beaux-arts de Liège), 15–29 July, Rue des Anglais 21, Liège. • 2001–2002: Towards Modernity: the 19th Century in the Country of Liège, 5 October 2001 – 20 January 2002, Museum of Walloon Art and Saint-Georges Hall, Liège (four paintings: Portrait of Father Henri Lacordaire, Study for Saint Lambert at the Banquet of Jupille, Portrait of Louis Jamme, and Portrait of Frédéric Rouveroy). • 2025–2026: 250 Years of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Liège: An Art School Across Four Centuries, 3 October 2025 – 18 January 2026, Fonds Patrimoniaux, Liège (his 1850 Self-portrait was exhibited).

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Auguste Chauvin was recorded at birth as Auguste Adolphe Chauvin. His recorded language was French. He married Maria Wilhelmina Buschbeck. One child is recorded: Victor Chauvin.

His work is associated with Düsseldorf school of painting and Nazarene movement. He was employed by Royal Academy of Arts of Liège. Recorded positions include Director of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Liège and teacher. He belonged to Royal Academy of Science, Letters and Fine Arts of Belgium. He worked at Neuwied and Liège.

Works recorded as notable number 8: The Banquet of Jupille, Farewell between Tobias and his blind Father, Portrait of father Henri Lacordaire, A final meeting of the mayors Beeckman and Laruelle, Portrait of the Baron Louis de Schiervel, Portrait of Louis Jamme, Portrait of Joseph Lebeau and Autoportrait. His recorded genres are religious, portrait and history.

Auguste Chauvin is recorded with the occupation painter. Recorded as painter and draftsperson.

• Illustration — Victor Lemaître, Review of the Exhibition, 16 July 1871 (detail from caricature, Le Rasoir no. 49) An 1865 article in La Meuse explained that Chauvin, as a teacher, "not only sought to employ the best methods in the teaching of drawing, modelling, and painting" but also worked to "form the taste of pupils from the best models and to acquaint them with different styles." The same article noted that the professor "attaches especially great importance to scientific education", aware as he was that "science and education assure the worker as well as the artist a more honourable and more independent place in society, and at the same time a more extended field of activity." At Chauvin's funeral, Achille Chainaye, one of his former pupils, offered this portrait of the teaching he received from his master:

• Pierre Joseph Antoine (1840–1913) • Émile-Édouard Berchmans (1843–1914) • Henri Berchmans (1856–1911) • Achille Chainaye (1862–1915) • Émile Delperée (1850–1896) • Jérémie Delsaux (1852–1927) • Alphonse de Tombay (1843–1918) • Adrien de Witte (1850–1935) • Edgar D'Hont (1861–1941) • Victor Fassin (1826–1906) • Victor Lemaître (1842–1880) • Léon Mignon (1847–1898) • François Namur (1857–1902) • Félix Nisen (1850–1889) • Léon Philippet (1843–1906) • Joseph Rulot (1853–1919) • Henri Simon (writer) (1856–1939) • Charles Soubre (1821–1895) • Émile Tasset (1838–1879) • Émile Ubaghs (1844–1879) • Jean Ubaghs (1852–1937)

Works by Auguste Chauvin are held by the Museum Kunstpalast in Düsseldorf, the Wallraf-Richartz Museum in Cologne, the Museum of Walloon Art in Liège, the Bishopric of Liège, Saint Paul's Cathedral, the Church of Notre-Dame de l'Assomption in Seraing, the Belgian Senate, the art collections of the Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles, and in numerous private collections.