Eugène Druet

The recorded working language is French. Places of work recorded in the authority are France. Work by Eugène Druet is recorded in the collections of Museum of Modern Art and J. Paul Getty Museum. Distinctions recorded are Officier de l'Instruction publique.

He was born at 206 rue du Faubourg-Saint-Martin in Paris to Eugène Alphonse Druet and Alphonine Augustine Herbinière, then grocers. He initially rented and ran Yacht Club français, a small family café at place de l'Alma (now avenue du Président-Wilson) which he bought in 1893. Auguste Rodin's Dépôt des marbres studio at 182 rue de l'Université was not far from 'Druet's café, and the sculptor regularly came to the latter and introduced him to the photography of art. After meeting Rodin in 1896, Druet produced several photographs of Rodin's sculptures and often acted as his official photographer. According to Hélène Pinet it is unclear why Rodin chose Druet but he may simply have been impressed by the amateur photographs Druet showed him. They worked together until 1900, when they little by little grew apart, notably because Druet was almost never paid for his voluntary work for Rodin. 1900 also saw Rodin's major retrospective at the pavillon de l'Alma during the Exposition universelle – it was almost entirely organised by Druet and included a section with 71 of his photographs. • Illustration — Invitation to the exhibition of drawings by André Rouveyre at the galerie E. Druet, 1907. On Rodin's advice Druet abandoned his café to open an art gallery at 114 rue du Faubourg-Saint-Honoré in 1903, moving to 20 rue Royale in 1908. It soon became well-known and is mentioned in chapter three of Gertrude Stein's Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas: on the other side of Paris, on rue du Faubourg-Saint-Honoré, was based the former restaurant owner and photographer Druet. His rich clients included Russian Ivan Morozov. In 1908 he was made an Officier de l'Instruction publique. He continued to photograph art, especially paintings. He thus sold paintings and his own photographs in his gallery. This idea to sell reproductions of paintings which he was exhibiting allowed him to make extra profits. Guillaume Apollinaire wrote that the photographs at the galerie Druet "reproduce in a completely satisfactory way famous paintings from Leonardo da Vinci to Maurice Denis via Titian, Ingres, Toulouse-Lautrec and Cézanne". he became recognised in art circles – for example, on 2 March 1913 he assisted in the major auction of works from the La peau de l'ours collection in rooms 7 and 8 of the hôtel Drouot, where he acted as an expert alongside Josse and Gaston Bernheim-Jeune. • Illustration — Apollo Sauroktonos, reproduction in the magazine Touche à tout, photographed using the Druet process. Between 1903 and 1938 his gallery exhibited nearly 1300 artists, including Georges Manzana-Pissarro, Charles Camoin, Henri Manguin, Théo van Rysselberghe, Odilon Redon Albert Marquet, Léon Lehmann, Maurice Denis, Jacqueline Marval, Paul Cézanne, Fernand Labat, Jules Cavaillès, Jean Fernand-Trochain and Maurice Georges Poncelet. He died in Paris of brain congestion in 1916. after his death his wife ran the gallery until 1938, when it closed. His archive of 30,000 plates were bought by François Antoine Vizzavona, himself a photographer of art and publisher.

• 1900, Paris, pavillon de l'Alma, with works by Auguste Rodin, with a section for Druet's photographs. • 16 January 1994 to 6 March 1994, Licht und Schatten. Rodin-Photographien von Eugène Druet, Georg Kolbe Museum, Berlin. • 14 November 2007 to 2 March 2008, Rodin sous l'œil des photographes, musée Rodin, Paris. • Illustration — Auguste Rodin, Monument to Balzac. • Illustration — Auguste Rodin, The Bronze Hand • Illustration — Auguste Rodin, Le Baiser (c. 1898). • Illustration — Paul Gauguin, Soyez amoureuses vous serez heureuses. • Illustration — Maurice Denis, Psyche Appears to Cupid. • Illustration — Vaslav Nijinsky in the Siamese dance from Orientales (1910). • Illustration — Façade of Roger & Gallet in Paris.

• Dates — Year(s) — Artist(s) — Notes • 5–16 November — 1903 — Théo van Rysselberghe • November–December — 1903 — Maurice Denis, Paul Sérusier, Ker-Xavier Roussel, Armand Seguin, Maximilien Luce, Henri-Edmond Cross & Albert Clouard • 22 November – 10 December — 1904 — Maurice Denis — Catalogue with a preface by André Gide • 1905 — Théo van Rysselberghe • January–February — 1905 — Berthe Morisot. • 1906 — Henri Matisse — Major retrospective • 18–30 November — 1907 — André Rouveyre — Original drawings • 25 October – 6 November — 1909 — Vladislav Granzow • 7–19 November — 1910 — André Lhote — Paintings • 27 February – 12 March — 1911 — Théo van Rysselberghe — Paintings • 1912 — Jacqueline Marval — 44 paintings, including The Three Roses (1910) • December — 1912 — Henri Farge • 1–13 December — 1913 — Jules Flandrin — Paintings • 1913 — Publicity for the catalogue for the La peau de l'ours sale, with 16 reproductions • 26 January – 7 February — 1914 — Raoul de Mathan • 9–21 February — 1914 — Baignières, Desvallières, Dethomas, Dufrénoy, Jules Flandrin, Charles Guérin, Marque, Rouault and Jacqueline Marval • 5–27 March — 1917 — Henri Valensi — Paintings and drawings of the Dardanelles campaign and of the 1915–1916 campaign in Greece as "painter to the expeditionary corps staff"; as well as being a painter the artist was an animator, film director, art theorician and one of the founders of musicalism. • 20–31 January — 1919 — Lucien Jacques and Joseph Gilardoni • 1921 — Albert Huyot • Summer — 1921 — Robert Bevan, Stanisława de Karłowska, Harold Gilman, Edward McKnight Kauffer, John Nash, Edward Wadsworth — Entitled "A Group of English Modern Painters". • November–December — 1921 — Robert Lotiron • 1922 — Lucien Jacques • 1922 — Lucien Jacques • 1922 — Henri Lebasque • 1923 — Théo van Rysselberghe • 1923 — Odilon Redon • 1924 — Pierre Bonnard — Retrospective • 1924 — Maurice Asselin • 1925 — Pedro Figari • 1926 — Irène Reno • March–April — 1926 — Jean Helleu • 1926 — Berthe Morisot — Pastels, watercolours, drawings and crayon drawings • December — 1926 — Jean Puy & Henry de Waroquier • 1929 — Zoum Walter • 1929, 1930, 1933, 1937 — Marcel Roche • 1932 — Adrienne Jouclard • 1933 — Dimitri Bouchène • 1934 — Joseph Rossi • |February — 1935 — Pauline Peugniez • 1935 — Émile Bouneau • 1935 — Celso Lagar • 1936 — Roland Oudot • 1936 — Jean Aujame • November — 1936 — Gérard Cochet, Othon Coubine, Henriette Deloras, Robert Lotiron, Jacques Lestrille, Hélène Marre & Georges Sabbagh — Recent works • 17–28 January — 1938 — Raymond Legueult • May–June — 1938 — André Villeboeuf