Prosper Lafaye
Prosper Lafaye (born September 23, 1806 in Mont-Saint-Sulpice , † March 3, 1883 in Paris ) was a French painter and glass painter .
Life
Prosper Lafaye was the son of the mason Victor Lafaist and Marie-Madeleine Chevalier. At the age of 14 he secretly left his family to live with his uncle Guillaume Sulpice Chevalier in Paris. Lafaye worked as an apprentice to the painter Lemoron and then to Bignon. In 1827 he worked in Auguste Couder's studio. In 1831 a work by Lafaye was exhibited for the first time in the salon: a portrait of Napoleon on horseback. From 1834 to 1837 he painted numerous battles for the Musée de l'Histoire de France in Versailles . Between 1838 and 1842 he received orders from the royal family. He also worked for numerous private individuals in Paris, who had their city palaces designed by him.
Stained glass
On a trip to Burgundy in 1845 he became interested in stained glass . With the Veissière family, Lafaye signed a contract on September 20, 1845 that regulated the collaboration. As a result, a glass painting workshop was set up in the rue de l'Empereur in Paris. His first commissions were restoration work in the Paris churches of Notre-Dame-des-Blancs-Manteaux and Saint-Eustache . After separating from the co-partners on August 5, 1846, he continued to run the workshop alone. Further restoration jobs followed in the Paris churches: Saint-Étienne-du-Mont , Saint-Nicolas-du-Chardonnet , Saint-Médard and Saint-Merry (also spelled Saint-Merri).
At the World's Fair in London in 1851 , Lafaye showed lead glass windows from his workshop. In the same year he had employed Annette and Sophie Coppée, who drew cardboard boxes for his workshop . On April 20, 1852, he married the younger of the sisters, Sophie Coppée. Since the quality of church windows was rediscovered in the middle of the 19th century, the Parisian glass painters received many orders for the restoration of these windows or for new ones. In addition to the churches mentioned above, Lafaye's workshop received orders to restore further windows in the Paris churches of St-Germain-l'Auxerrois , St-Gervais-St-Protais , Saint-Séverin , St-Paul-St-Louis and Saint- Sulpice . Prosper Lafaye created his own windows for the Paris churches of Sainte-Clotilde , St-Leu-St-Gilles and for the rose window of St-Augustin . His only commission for a church outside Paris was in Blanzy-les-Mines (now Montceau-les-Mines ) in 1860. In 1863, Prosper Lafaye donated a window depicting his deceased family members for the church in his birthplace, Mont-Saint-Sulpice .
Since Prosper Lafaye had acquired a good reputation, he was also commissioned to restore the lead glass windows in the Louvre (1864–1866). He was represented with works at the world exhibitions of 1855 , 1867 and 1878 . The Musée Carnavalet owns many drawings (cardboard boxes) by Prosper and Sophie Lafaye.
After his death, his workshop was closed because none of his three daughters (Sara, Ève and Geneviève) learned his trade. His son Savinien died at the age of one in 1854.
Works
Drawings and paintings by Prosper Lafaye can be found in the following museums, among others: Musée d'Art et Histoire in Auxerre , Musée des beaux-arts in Caen , Musée des beaux-arts in Dijon , Musée des beaux-arts in Orléans , Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Musée Carnavalet and Musée des Arts décoratifs in Paris.
Publications
- Note sur l'état actuel de l'art de la peinture sur verre au sujet des réparations à faire aux vitraux de l'église Saint-Étienne du Mont, Paris 1849
- Exposition universelle de Londres. Vitraux, Paris 1851
- Mémoire au sujet des vitraux anciens. État où ils se trouvent après le siège dans les églises de Paris adressé à Monsieur le Préfet de la Seine, Paris 1871
literature
- Elisabeth Pillet: Le vitrail à Paris au XIXe siècle. Entretenir, conserver, restaurer. ( Corpus Vitrearum France - Études IX) Presses Universitaires de Rennes, Rennes 2010, ISBN 978-2-7535-0945-0 , pp. 309-310.
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Lafaye, Prosper |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | French painter and glass painter |
| DATE OF BIRTH | September 23, 1806 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Mont-Saint-Sulpice |
| DATE OF DEATH | March 3, 1883 |
| Place of death | Paris |