In the footsteps of Gustave Fayet

Villeneuve-lès-Avignon, Béziers, Arles. In 2011, Magali Rougeot, author of the thesis Gustave Fayet (1865-1925). Itinerary of a collectorpresented in particular Yellow Christ (1889), Matamua (formerly) (1892), Te Arii Vahine (King’s wife) (1896) and the relief Be mysterious (1890) by Paul Gauguin as having belonged to Gustave Fayet. She also dedicated eight Van Gogh, two Cézanne, three Renoir and three Bonnard and, from Redon, one of her closest friends, a musician like him, twenty-six papers and canvases as well as the big triptychs stretched in the Fontfroide abbey library, near Narbonne. Today, conservative Sylvie Patry, who is preparing an exhibition in two parts (Gustave Fayet Collector and Painter) which will be held from the fall of 2026 at the Louis Vuitton Foundation, argues that he owned more than 200 Gauguin … But the public can already discover Fayet thanks to exhibitions, photographic journeys and concerns taking place until 2017 in Languedoc, in Provence and in Provence and Île-de-France.

Born in Béziers (Hérault) in a rich family, Gustave Fayet was a businessman and winegrower, like his father and uncle. And, like them, he was a painter. As part of the centenary season organized by the family united in the association of the Museum of Art Gustave Fayet in Fontfroide, the Saint-André Abbaye, in Villeneuve-lès-Avignon (Gard), presents more than 100 works that it has drawn, engraved or painted in Provence.

The Fayet met at the end of 1915 Elsa Koeberlé and Génia Lioubow, writers and painters who seek a place conducive to their work and were seduced by this Saint-André abbey. Already the owner since 1908 of the Fontfroide Abbey, acquired to avoid his dismantling, Gustave Fayet bought Saint-André in August 1916 in order to house the couple of creators whom he called, in the legend of a drawing, “The Liokoe”. Now attached to Provence, the collector of Van Gogh, Gauguin and Cézanne painted it with their example in mind and in a spirit close to symbolism. At the end of 1920, he bought Villa Costebrune, in Pradet, near Toulon, including Olivier Schuwer, general coordinator of the Fayet season (1), shows the importance in a test of the catalog Gustave Fayet in Provence. Between December 1921 and February 1922, he himself adorned the walls of the Villa Costebrune of decorative paintings inspired this time by Greece and Japan.

In Béziers, Fayet and Japan

This taste for Japan is the subject of the exhibition bringing together 54 works and documents at the Fayet Museum in Béziers. Born in this house, Fayet resided there until 1905, was the curator of the city’s collections and organized, in 1901, a fair thanks to which the Biterrois discovered Cézanne, Gauguin, Redon and even the young Picasso. The museum was clear to, in return, discover the importance of Japanese art for Fayet, an aspect of his collector’s career so far very little studied. He bought his first Japanese art objects in Béziers in 1895 and his first six prints for sale after death of Edmond de Goncourt, in 1897. During his life, he owned around 1,200, for the majority of them acquired in the years 1907-1908, sometimes sold or exchanged for others, and he distributed them between his various residences. For the sale of the Charles Gillot collection, in 1904, he acquired a sculpture, a wooden carp, lacquer and mother -of -pearl for the substantial sum of 800 francs. These purchases took place in Paris but also in Languedoc, especially with a traveling merchant, Armand housed.

The director of the museum, Stéphanie found, set out to show that the Fayet lived their Japanese passion on a daily basis. A Japanese dress from the Parisian house Babani (around 1900) that belonged to Madeleine Fayet and photographs testify to this. Eastern spirituality, materialized by statues of the Buddha, permeated the places where Gustave worked. At the Château d’Igny (Essonne), acquired in 1912 (the family then lived in Paris, rue de Bellechasse), a number of prints were hung in the corridors, sheltered from light. In a catalog test, Lucie Chopard and Olivier Schuwer describe Fayet’s taste for superimonothese small prints ordered by scholars to serve as invitations or greeting cards.

This Japanese collection inspired him in an area in which it seems that he wanted to convert, the decorative arts and the profession of decorator. His sandstone vases inspired by Japan, created with Louis Paul, were exhibited by Bing in 1899. He had fabrics printed whose patterns and his carpets appeared at the International Exhibition of Decorative Arts in 1925. Finally, his activity as an illustrator should not be forgotten. It is celebrated at Museon Arlaten, in Arles, who presents in the exhibition “But what a country!” », Scenographed by Christian Lacroix, his 72 drawings for the edition of Mireille from Frédéric Mistral. In prefiguration, Actes Sud editions have published Mireio/Mireille (2024), the original text and a new translation of this poem with the illustrations of Fayet.