THE MONT VENTOUX BY NICOLAS DE STAËL

NICOLAS DE STAËL (1914-1955)
Mont Ventoux (1,911 m - 6, 270 ft )
France (Provence)

In Carte de vœux illustrée from a colored  lithograph printed by Fequet et Baudier.
Feuillet ,  21 x 16, 5 cm. Private collection


HAPPY NEW YEAR 2022
This is the 1525th mountain paintings published in this blogs since 2011
Many thanks to have followed us trought all these years.
 

About this work
No certitude about what represent that drawing made for a postcard but it could possibly be a view of the Mont Ventoux (the upper line in grey)  from the Luberon (in blue) a place in Provence Nicolas de Staël Lived many years, particularly in Menerbes where he had a house. It could be as well a woman breast...

The painter
Nicolas de Staël was a French painter of Russian origin known for his use of a thick impasto and his highly abstract landscape painting. Nicolas de Staël was born Nikolai Vladimirovich Stael von Holstein (Николай Владимирович Шталь фон Гольштейн) in Saint Petersbourg (Russia), into the family of a Baron Vladimir Stael von Holstein, the last Commandant of the Peter and Paul Fortress. De Staël's family was forced to emigrate to Poland in 1919 because of the Russian Revolution ; both his father and stepmother died in Poland and the orphaned Nicolas de Staël was sent with his older sister Marina to Brussels to live with a Russian family (1922)...
- More about Nicolas de Stael biography

The mountain 
Mont Ventoux (Ventor in Latin) is located in the French department of Vaucluse (Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur). Culminating at 1,911 meters - 6, 270 ft, it is about 25 kilometers long on an east-west for 15 kilometers wide on a north-south axis. Nicknamed the Giant of Provence, it is the culmination of the Monts du Vaucluse, the ultimate link of the Southern Alps and the highest peak of Vaucluse. Its geographical isolation makes it visible over great distances.
Mont Ventoux is as well the linguistic border between the north and south-Occitan.
Its mainly calcareous nature is responsible, in its top part, its deep white color in every season and intense karstification due to erosion by water, with the presence of numerous scree on the south face. Precipitation is particularly abundant in spring and fall. Rainwater seeps into galleries and reflects the level of the variable flow resurgences such as Fontaine de Vaucluse or Source du Groseau.
Mont Ventoux is subject to a Mediterranean dominant weather, sometimes causing scorching temperatures during summer, the altitude offering a wide variety of climates, to the top (continental influence of mountain type), through a temperate climate (mid-slopes). In addition, the north wind can be very violent and the Mistral blows almost half part of the year.
This particular geomorphology and climate make it a rich and fragile environmental site consisting of many levels of vegetation. It is s a biosphere reserve by UNESCO and Natura 2000 site.
If human settlements are found in the foothills in prehistoric times, the first ascent to the summit would work on 26 April 1336, the poet Petrarch from Malaucène on the northern slope. It opens the way later in numerous scientific studies.
Thereafter, for nearly six centuries, Mont Ventoux has been intensely deforested to provide the shipbuilding in Toulon, charcoal manufacturers and sheep farmers. During World War II, the mountain is home to the Ventoux maquis, the french Resistance against Nazis.
Since 1966, the summit is topped with an observation tower over forty meters high topped by a TV and satellite antenna.
While sheep farming has almost disappeared, beekeeping, gardening (especially cherries), viticulture, harvesting of mushrooms including truffles and, to a lesser extent,  lavender, are still practiced.
Mont Ventoux is an important symbolic figure of Provence that fed oral or literary works and artistic performances or pictorial map.

__________________________________________

2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

THE MONT VENTOUX PAINTED BY PAUL SURTEL

 

PAUL SURTEL (1893-1985)

 The mont Ventoux (1, 911m - 6, 270ft)

 France (Provence-Alpe-Côte-d'Azur)  

In The mont Ventoux from west , oil on cardboard, (not signed), Private collection, France

 

One can notice that there is not a single tree on those paintings of the Mont Ventoux, which is no longer the case today. This is the result of an intensive reforestation policy carried out by the French State services on this mountain which had been devastated by the forestry exploitation in the late 19th and the early 20th century.

The mountain 

Mont Ventoux  (1, 911m - 6, 270ft), Ventor in Latin, is located in the French department of Vaucluse (Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur). It is about 25 kilometers long on an east-west for 15 kilometers wide on a north-south axis. Nicknamed the Giant of Provence, it is the culmination of the Monts du Vaucluse, the ultimate link of the Southern Alps and the highest peak of Vaucluse. Its geographical isolation makes it visible over great distances.

The painter 

Paul Surtel is a French painter and epistolier, the son of a family of coffee makers and restaurateurs living in the Paris region. Fernand Maillaud, the "good master",  a landscape painter, very good friend of Paul's father, introduced him very early to painting. In1904, Paul Surtel went up to Paris,at the Lycée Charlemagne and the Arts Décoratifs, but especially at the "l'école buissonnière", visiting  museums and exhibitions in the galleries of Paris instead to go to school ! He then became passionate for Rembrandt and especially Corot (who greatly influenced him).
At the end of the First World War, he was enlisted as an artilleryman (at the beginning of 1917). From Seine and Marne in Lorraine, Belgium, Somme, he went from offensive to cantonments. Then he allows himself to be taken back by nature, draws, leaves emotion to guide his hand, the craft acquiring itself by dint of attention and work.
Demobilized in Hyères, Paul found a forestry foreman occupation in the Var, and discovered the Provençal nature that would become the source of his work and would make him known as a "regionalist painter", a rather pejorative label to carry in France until very recently.  In 1937, during one of his first exhibitions in Oran (Algeria, at that time French department) Paul Surtel meets Elia Duc, a young teacher in a small the algerian city. They married in 1939. After that follows 48 years of passionate creation and happiness, especially in Peipin, a tiny village in the Alpes of Haute Provence where the couple settled. His paintings radiate tenderness, lightness, effusion, through impalpable matter. After two years in Quercy, then three in Orange, the family settles in Carpentras (Vaucluse), in 1951, where Elia is named professor.
From the 60s, Paul Surtel added landscapes, still-lifes and portraits.

___________________________

2021 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MONT VENTOUX PAINTED BY A. G. CARRICK / H.M KING CHARLES III

 

A. G. CARRICK / H.M KING CHARLES III former PRINCE OF WALES (bn.1948)
Mont Ventoux (1,911 m - 6, 270 ft)
France (Provence)

In Mont Ventoux seen from Le Barroux, watercolor, 1999

The painter
Arthur George Carrick is actually H.M. the King Charles III, former Prince of Wales.
When he began showing his paintings, he was too nervous to display his name so displayed under a pseudonym. Arthur George are two of his names (Charles Phillip Arthur George) and one of his titles is Earl of Carrick. King Charles III is an experienced watercolourist.  He has been painting for most of his adult life, during holidays or when his official diary allows. King Charles' interest began during the 1970s and 1980s when he was inspired by Robert Waddell, who had been his art master at Gordonstoun in Scotland. In time, King Charles met leading artists such as Edward Seago, with whom he discussed watercolour technique, and received further tuition from John Ward, Bryan Organ and Derek Hill.
The Royal Family has a tradition of drawing and painting, and King Charles’ work first came to public notice at a 1977 exhibition at Windsor Castle at which other Royal artists included Queen Victoria, The Duke of Edinburgh and The Duke of York.
King Charles paints in the open air, often finishing a picture in one go and his favourite locations include The Queen's estate at Balmoral in Scotland and Sandringham House in Norfolk, England. Sometimes King Charles  III paints during his skiing holidays, and during overseas tours when possible.
The copyright of King Charles' watercolours belongs to A. G. Carrick Ltd, a trading arm of The King's Charities Foundation. Over the years King Charles III has agreed to exhibitions of his watercolours and of lithographs made from them, on the understanding that any income they generate goes to The Prince of Wales's Charitable Foundation.
Money from the sale of the lithographs also goes to the Foundation but the paintings themselves are never for sale.
In the 1980s King Charles III, then Prince of Wales,  began inviting young British artists to accompany him on official tours overseas and record their impressions, a tradition that has continued to this day.
Reference :
- The prince of Wales paintings 

The mountain
Mont Ventoux (Ventor in Latin) is located in the French department of Vaucluse (Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur). Culminating at 1,911 meters - 6, 270 ft, it is about 25 kilometers long on an east-west for 15 kilometers wide on a north-south axis. Nicknamed the Giant of Provence, it is the culmination of the Monts du Vaucluse, the ultimate link of the Southern Alps and the highest peak of Vaucluse. Its geographical isolation makes it visible over great distances.
Mont Ventoux is as well the linguistic border between the north and south-Occitan.
Its mainly calcareous nature is responsible, in its top part, its deep white color in every season and intense karstification due to erosion by water, with the presence of numerous scree on the south face. Precipitation is particularly abundant in spring and fall. Rainwater seeps into galleries and reflects the level of the variable flow resurgences such as Fontaine de Vaucluse or Source du Groseau.
Mont Ventoux is subject to a Mediterranean dominant weather, sometimes causing scorching temperatures during summer, the altitude offering a wide variety of climates, to the top (continental influence of mountain type), through a temperate climate (mid-slopes). In addition, the north wind can be very violent and the Mistral blows almost half part of the year.
This particular geomorphology and climate make it a rich and fragile environmental site consisting of many levels of vegetation. It is s a biosphere reserve by UNESCO and Natura 2000 site.
If human settlements are found in the foothills in prehistoric times, the first ascent to the summit would work on 26 April 1336, the poet Petrarch from Malaucène on the northern slope. It opens the way later in numerous scientific studies.
Thereafter, for nearly six centuries, Mont Ventoux has been intensely deforested to provide the shipbuilding in Toulon, charcoal manufacturers and sheep farmers. During World War II, the mountain is home to the Ventoux maquis, the french Resistance against Nazis.
Since 1966, the summit is topped with an observation tower over forty meters high topped by a TV and satellite antenna.
While sheep farming has almost disappeared, beekeeping, gardening (especially cherries), viticulture, harvesting of mushrooms including truffles and, to a lesser extent, lavender, are still practiced.
Mont Ventoux is an important symbolic figure of Provence that fed oral or literary works and artistic performances or pictorial map.

_______________________________
2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MONT VENTOUX PAINTED BY NICOLAS FROMENT

NICOLAS FROMENT  (c.1430-1486), (circle of) 

Mont Ventoux (1, 911 m - 6, 270ft) 

France (Provence)

In Le Rétable des Pérussis  (The Pérussis Altarpiece) 1480, 

oil and gold on wood, (1, 38m x 58.4 cm), 

The MET Museum (not on view)

About the painting
The subject of this large altarpiece, the adoration of the empty cross on Golgatha, is unusual. According to a documented inscription on the lost original frame, the painting was made in 1480 for Aloisius Rudolphe de Pérussis, whose family coat of arms and motto are displayed on the side panels. One of the kneeling donors, presented by John the Baptist and Saint Francis, may be Aloisius himself. Originally from Florence, the Pérussis or Peruzzi took refuge in Avignon after they were exiled by Cosimo de' Medici in 1434. Included in the background landscape is a faithful topographical view of Avignon, its famous brigde  (before it was partially destroyed  in  its middle by floods, an din the background the Mont Ventoux.

The mountain
Mont Ventoux (Ventor in Latin) is located in the French department of Vaucluse (Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur). Culminating at 1,911 meters - 6, 270 ft, it is about 25 kilometers long on an east-west for 15 kilometers wide on a north-south axis. Nicknamed the Giant of Provence, it is the culmination of the Monts du Vaucluse, the ultimate link of the Southern Alps and the highest peak of Vaucluse. Its geographical isolation makes it visible over great distances.
Mont Ventoux is as well the linguistic border between the north and south-Occitan.
Its mainly calcareous nature is responsible, in its top part, its deep white color in every season and intense karstification due to erosion by water, with the presence of numerous scree on the south face. Precipitation is particularly abundant in spring and fall. Rainwater seeps into galleries and reflects the level of the variable flow resurgences such as Fontaine de Vaucluse or Source du Groseau.
Mont Ventoux is subject to a Mediterranean dominant weather, sometimes causing scorching temperatures during summer, the altitude offering a wide variety of climates, to the top (continental influence of mountain type), through a temperate climate (mid-slopes). In addition, the north wind can be very violent and the Mistral blows almost half part of the year.
This particular geomorphology and climate make it a rich and fragile environmental site consisting of many levels of vegetation. It is s a biosphere reserve by UNESCO and Natura 2000 site.
If human settlements are found in the foothills in prehistoric times, the first ascent to the summit would work on 26 April 1336, the poet Petrarch from Malaucène on the northern slope. It opens the way later in numerous scientific studies.
Thereafter, for nearly six centuries, Mont Ventoux has been intensely deforested to provide the shipbuilding in Toulon, charcoal manufacturers and sheep farmers. During World War II, the mountain is home to the Ventoux maquis, the french Resistance against Nazis.
Since 1966, the summit is topped with an observation tower over forty meters high topped by a TV and satellite antenna.
While sheep farming has almost disappeared, beekeeping, gardening (especially cherries), viticulture, harvesting of mushrooms including truffles and, to a lesser extent, lavender, are still practiced.
Mont Ventoux is an important symbolic figure of Provence that fed oral or literary works and artistic performances or pictorial map.

The painter
Nicolas Froment  was a French painter of the Early Renaissance.,birn in Uzes and died in Avignon.  Nicolas Froment is one of the most notable representatives of the Second School of Avignon, (École d'Avignon), a group of artists at the court of the Popes in Avignon, who were located there from 1309 to 1411, in Avignon.
He was influenced by the Flemish style that characterizes the last phase of the Gothic.
He undertook to paint an altarpiece 12 February 1470 in Aix for a rich widow called Catherine Spifami; in the center of the panel is a depicting the Death of Mary, and on the side panels, the Saints Mary Magdalene and Catherine are shown. He was attributed a number of works from this time, but none of these attributions can be considered reliable.
One of the most interesting work of this group is the Retable des Pérussis or The Pérussis Altarpiece (above).

__________________________________________
2019 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

THE MONT VENTOUX BY ENGUERRAND QUARTON

 ENGUERRAND QUARTON (1410-15? - 1466)  

 Mont Ventoux (1, 911 m - 6, 270ft) 

 France (Provence)

1a.  The Coronation of the Virgin, 1453-54 (detail of the Mont Ventoux behind the Golgotha 

1b.  The Coronation of the Virgin, 1453-54, Tempera on panel, Pierre de Luxembourg Museum,  Villeneuve-lez-Avignon 

2.  Avignon Pieta or Villeneuve Pieta, 1455, Tempera and gold on walnut, Louvre Museum, Paris   

About the paintings 

Since the 15th century, Mont Ventoux, because of the vicinity of Avignon, the Popes city,  has been the subject of many paintings and engravings, either as a main subject or in the background landscape. 

Its oldest and very first representation can be found in The Coronation of the Virgin (1b above) painted circa 1453-54 by Enguerrand Quarton. This panel was formerly used to adorn the chapel of the Cartusian monastery of Villeneuve-lez-Avignon; it is currently preserved in the Musée Pierre-de-Luxembourg in that same  city. The Mont Ventoux appears at the bottom of the painting on the left of Golgotha ​​(see enlargement 1a) just behind the walls of the city of Villeneuve lez Avignon and its Collegiale church; in the middle, the Rhone river separating Villeneuve from a bigger city on the other bank, which is Avignon,  clearly  recognizable with its circular walls and its famous Pope's Palace (painted in red here like the religious monuments were at that time), exactly like everything is still geographically situated nowadays.
If we except the fact it is not  the good location, some experts said that the mountain represented could be the Sainte Victoire, the one Paul Cézanne painted such a lot of time a few centuries later) . Why not but after all ?  Enguerrand Quarton lived in Aix-en-Provence at theKing René's court and had enough times to observe this mountain under every angles and to paint it.  It could be the Sainte Victoire, and it ressembles to it by some aspects,  but it  is more likely the Mont Ventoux to which the shape of the mountain painted ressembles more.  It should be as well a mix of the both mountains, the geographical accuracy of landscape rendering being not a characteristic of this period.
But... the Sainte-Victoire is not situated near Avignon or behind Villeneuve les Avignon, while  the Ventoux is !  The Sainte Victoire is near Aix-en-Provence, 70 km off.  Actually, the Sainte Victoire is situated on the opposite bank of the Rhone River. that the one shown in that painting...

Another painting, The Avignon Pieta  (2) sometimes called The Villeneuve Pieta,  painted one year later, in 1455, attributed to the same Enguerrand Quarton and currently exhibited at the Louvre Museum in Paris, also clearly represents Mont Ventoux, visible on the extreme right side of the composition, next to the red coat of Maria Magdelena.

The painter 

Enguerrand Quarton (or Charonton) (c. 1410- 1415– 1466) was a French painter and manuscript illuminator very representative of the distinctive French style of that time. Quarton began to work in the Netherlands. Then he moved to Aix-en-Provence and  Arles in 1446, and then in Avignon, where he was based from 1447 until his death there in about 1466. In Avignon and Villeneuve les Avignon he pain ted The Coronation of the Virgin (1453-54)  and the Avignon Pieta (1455).  

Provence at this time had some of the most impressive painters in France, like Nicolas Froment or Barthélemy d'Eyck, who both appear to have collaborated with Quarton. The Popes and Anti-Popes were no longer living in Avignon, but it remained Papal territory, and the city contained many Italian merchants.

Except for some banners, no works by Quarton for René of Anjou,  the King René, ruler of most of Provence, are documented, although King René was a keen patron of the arts who employed d'Eyck for many years and patronised several other artists. Many of Quarton's clients were important figures in René's court and administration, like the Chancellor of Provence who commissioned the Missal of Jean des Martins.
Six paintings by Quarton are documented, of which only two survive.  His two documented works are the remarkable Coronation of the Virgin (1453–54) (above) and The Virgin of Mercy (1452, Musée Condé, Chantilly). Two smaller altarpieces are also attributed to him. The famous Avignon Pieta is given also by the Louvre Museum like "probably painted and attribuated to " Enguerrant Quarton.  A number of miniatures in illuminated manuscripts have been ascribed to Quarton, whose style has many distinctive features, in colouring, modelling and iconography.

The mountain 
Mont Ventoux (Ventor in Latin) is located in the French department of Vaucluse (Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur). Culminating at 1,911 meters - 6, 270 ft, it is about 25 kilometers long on an east-west for 15 kilometers wide on a north-south axis. Nicknamed the Giant of Provence, it is the culmination of the Monts du Vaucluse, the ultimate link of the Southern Alps and the highest peak of Vaucluse. Its geographical isolation makes it visible over great distances.
Mont Ventoux is as well the linguistic border between the north and south-Occitan.
Its mainly calcareous nature is responsible, in its top part, its deep white color in every season and intense karstification due to erosion by water, with the presence of numerous scree on the south face. Precipitation is particularly abundant in spring and fall. Rainwater seeps into galleries and reflects the level of the variable flow resurgences such as Fontaine de Vaucluse or Source du Groseau.
Mont Ventoux is subject to a Mediterranean dominant weather, sometimes causing scorching temperatures during summer, the altitude offering a wide variety of climates, to the top (continental influence of mountain type), through a temperate climate (mid-slopes). In addition, the north wind can be very violent and the Mistral blows almost half part of the year.
This particular geomorphology and climate make it a rich and fragile environmental site consisting of many levels of vegetation. It is s a biosphere reserve by UNESCO and Natura 2000 site.
If human settlements are found in the foothills in prehistoric times, the first ascent to the summit would work on 26 April 1336, the poet Petrarch from Malaucène on the northern slope. It opens the way later in numerous scientific studies.
Thereafter, for nearly six centuries, Mont Ventoux has been intensely deforested to provide the shipbuilding in Toulon, charcoal manufacturers and sheep farmers. During World War II, the mountain is home to the Ventoux maquis, the french Resistance against Nazis.
Since 1966, the summit is topped with an observation tower over forty meters high topped by a TV and satellite antenna.
While sheep farming has almost disappeared, beekeeping, gardening (especially cherries), viticulture, harvesting of mushrooms including truffles and, to a lesser extent,  lavender, are still practiced.
Mont Ventoux is an important symbolic figure of Provence that fed oral or literary works and artistic performances or pictorial map.

MONT VENTOUX PHOTOGRAPHED BY FRANCIS ROUSSEAU

©Francis Rousseau, all rights reserved.
Mont Ventoux (1, 911 m - 6, 270ft)
France (Provence)
In Mont Ventoux, photo by FR ©2017
Original HD photo on sale on
https://www.revelles.fr/photographe/francis-rousseau

#revelles

The mountain 
Mont Ventoux (Ventor in Latin) is located in the French department of Vaucluse (Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur). Culminating at 1,911 meters - 6, 270 ft, it is about 25 kilometers long on an east-west for 15 kilometers wide on a north-south axis. Nicknamed the Giant of Provence, it is the culmination of the Monts du Vaucluse, the ultimate link of the Southern Alps and the highest peak of Vaucluse. Its geographical isolation makes it visible over great distances.
Mont Ventoux is as well the linguistic border between the north and south-Occitan.
Its mainly calcareous nature is responsible, in its top part, its deep white color in every season and intense karstification due to erosion by water, with the presence of numerous scree on the south face. Precipitation is particularly abundant in spring and fall. Rainwater seeps into galleries and reflects the level of the variable flow resurgences such as Fontaine de Vaucluse or Source du Groseau.
Mont Ventoux is subject to a Mediterranean dominant weather, sometimes causing scorching temperatures during summer, the altitude offering a wide variety of climates, to the top (continental influence of mountain type), through a temperate climate (mid-slopes). In addition, the north wind can be very violent and the Mistral blows almost half part of the year.
This particular geomorphology and climate make it a rich and fragile environmental site consisting of many levels of vegetation. It is s a biosphere reserve by UNESCO and Natura 2000 site.
If human settlements are found in the foothills in prehistoric times, the first ascent to the summit would work on 26 April 1336, the poet Petrarch from Malaucène on the northern slope. It opens the way later in numerous scientific studies.
Thereafter, for nearly six centuries, Mont Ventoux has been intensely deforested to provide the shipbuilding in Toulon, charcoal manufacturers and sheep farmers. During World War II, the mountain is home to the Ventoux maquis, the french Resistance against Nazis.
Since 1966, the summit is topped with an observation tower over forty meters high topped by a TV and satellite antenna.
While sheep farming has almost disappeared, beekeeping, gardening (especially cherries), viticulture, harvesting of mushrooms including truffles and, to a lesser extent,  lavender, are still practiced.
Mont Ventoux is an important symbolic figure of Provence that fed oral or literary works and artistic performances or pictorial map.

MONT VENTOUX PAINTED BY PAUL SURTEL

PAUL SURTEL (1893-1985)

 The mont Ventoux (1, 911m - 6, 270ft)

 France (Provence-Alpe-Côte-d'Azur)  

1. The mont Ventoux from north, oil on cardboard, Private collection, France

2.  The mont Ventoux from south-west, oil on cardboard, Private collection, France

 3. The mont Ventoux from west , oil on cardboard, (not signed), Private collection, France

 4. The mont Ventoux from south, oil on cardboard, Private collection, France

 5. The mont Ventoux from Les Alpilles,  oil on cardboard, Private collection, Switzerland

One can notice that there is not a single tree on those paintings of the Mont Ventoux, which is no longer the case today. This is the result of an intensive reforestation policy carried out by the French State services on this mountain which had been devastated by the forestry exploitation in the late 19th and the early 20th century.

The mountain 

Mont Ventoux  (1, 911m - 6, 270ft), Ventor in Latin, is located in the French department of Vaucluse (Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur). It is about 25 kilometers long on an east-west for 15 kilometers wide on a north-south axis. Nicknamed the Giant of Provence, it is the culmination of the Monts du Vaucluse, the ultimate link of the Southern Alps and the highest peak of Vaucluse. Its geographical isolation makes it visible over great distances.

- More about Mont Ventoux 

The painter 

Paul Surtel is a French painter and epistolier, the son of a family of coffee makers and restaurateurs living in the Paris region. Fernand Maillaud, the "good master",  a landscape painter, very good friend of Paul's father, introduced him very early to painting. In1904, Paul Surtel went up to Paris,at the Lycée Charlemagne and the Arts Décoratifs, but especially at the "l'école buissonnière", visiting  museums and exhibitions in the galleries of Paris instead to go to school ! He then became passionate for Rembrandt and especially Corot (who greatly influenced him).
At the end of the First World War, he was enlisted as an artilleryman (at the beginning of 1917). From Seine and Marne in Lorraine, Belgium, Somme, he went from offensive to cantonments. Then he allows himself to be taken back by nature, draws, leaves emotion to guide his hand, the craft acquiring itself by dint of attention and work.
Demobilized in Hyères, Paul found a forestry foreman occupation in the Var, and discovered the Provençal nature that would become the source of his work and would make him known as a "regionalist painter", a rather pejorative label to carry in France until very recently.  In 1937, during one of his first exhibitions in Oran (Algeria, at that time French department) Paul Surtel meets Elia Duc, a young teacher in a small the algerian city. They married in 1939. After that follows 48 years of passionate creation and happiness, especially in Peipin, a tiny village in the Alpes of Haute Provence where the couple settled. His paintings radiate tenderness, lightness, effusion, through impalpable matter. After two years in Quercy, then three in Orange, the family settles in Carpentras (Vaucluse), in 1951, where Elia is named professor.
From the 60s, Paul Surtel added landscapes, still-lifes and portraits.

THE MONT VENTOUX BY CAMILLE COROT

CAMILLE COROT (1796-1875) 

 Mont Ventoux (1, 911m - 6, 270ft) 

France (Vaucluse) 

In Villeneuve-les-Avignon, 1836,  oil on academy board mounted on canvas  

Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, USA 

The mountain  

Mont Ventoux  (1, 911m - 6, 270ft), Ventor in Latin, is located in the French department of Vaucluse (Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur). It is about 25 kilometers long on an east-west for 15 kilometers wide on a north-south axis. Nicknamed the Giant of Provence, it is the culmination of the Monts du Vaucluse, the ultimate link of the Southern Alps and the highest peak of Vaucluse. Its geographical isolation makes it visible over great distances.
Mont Ventoux is as well the linguistic border between the north and south-Occitan.
Its mainly calcareous nature is responsible, in its top part, its deep white color in every season and intense karstification due to erosion by water, with the presence of numerous scree on the south face. Precipitation is particularly abundant in spring and fall. Rainwater seeps into galleries and reflects the level of the variable flow resurgences such as Fontain-de-Vaucluse or Source du Groseau.
Mont Ventoux is subject to a Mediterranean dominant weather, sometimes causing scorching temperatures during summer, the altitude offering a wide variety of climates, to the top (continental influence of mountain type), through a temperate climate (mid-slopes). In addition, the north wind can be very violent and the Mistral blows almost half part of the year.
This particular geomorphology and climate make it a rich and fragile environmental site consisting of many levels of vegetation. It is s a biosphere reserve by UNESCO and Natura 2000 site.
If human settlements are found in the foothills in prehistoric times, the first ascent to the summit would work on 26 April 1336, the poet Petrarch from Malaucène on the northern slope. It opens the way later in numerous scientific studies.
Thereafter, for nearly six centuries, Mont Ventoux has been intensely deforested to provide the shipbuilding in Toulon, charcoal manufacturers and sheep farmers. During World War II, the mountain is home to the Ventoux maquis, the french Resistance against Nazis.
Since 1966, the summit is topped with an observation tower over forty meters high topped by a TV and satellite antenna.
While sheep farming has almost disappeared, beekeeping, gardening (especially cherries), viticulture, harvesting of mushrooms including truffles and, to a lesser extent,  lavender, are still practiced.
Mont Ventoux is an important symbolic figure of Provence that fed oral or literary works and artistic performances or pictorial map. It is represented since 1445 in the famous Pieta d'Avignon  by Engurerant Quarton (Musée du Louvre Paris), where one can see it painted on the right, behind Mary Magdalene weeping at the feet of Christ.
Before being covered by three main roads, which enabled the development of green tourism and outdoor sports both in summer and winter in particular with the organization of major cycling races, motor cars and other challenges, mountain was crisscrossed by sheep tracks traced by shepherds as a result of the growth of sheep between the fourteenth century and the mid-nineteenth century. These roads have now been turned into hiking trails, like the GR 4 and GR 9.

 The painter 

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, French landscape and portrait painter as well as a printmaker in etching,  is a pivotal figure in landscape painting.  His vast output simultaneously refers the Neo-Classical tradition and anticipates the plein-air innovations of Impressionism.
Camille Corot, no doubt attracted by the mythical aspect of Monte Soratte, painted it several times during his first stay in Italy between 1825 and 1830. They were painted at different times of the year ant different hours of the day as Hokusai used to do with the Fujiyama. 
Indeed, with his parents' support, Corot followed the well-established pattern of French painters who went to Italy to study the masters of the Italian Renaissance and to draw the crumbling monuments of Roman antiquity.  A condition by his parents before leaving was that he paint a self-portrait for them, his first.  During  his stay in Italy, Corot completed over 200 drawings and 150 paintings !
- More about Camille Corot's life and works 

Notice about this painting   

Corot spent the summer of 1836 in Provence, where he and his fellow painters rose early each day to sketch directly from nature. This view of Villeneuve-les-Avignon with its luminous atmosphere and sense of rapid execution reflects his study in Italy. On the right is the medieval tower Tour Philippe Le Bel, the village of Villeneuve les Avignon near Avignon, the Rhone River on right and, in the background, the Mont Ventoux. 

MONT VENTOUX PAINTED BY JULES LAURENS

JULES LAURENS (1823-1901)

Le Mont Ventoux (1,911 m - 6,270ft) 

France 

In Vue de la route de Bedouin, oil on canvas, Musée Contadin-Duplessis, Carpentras, France

The mountain 

Mont Ventoux (Ventor in Latin) is located in the French department of Vaucluse (Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur). Culminating at 1,911 meters - 6, 270 ft, it is about 25 kilometers long on an east-west for 15 kilometers wide on a north-south axis. Nicknamed the Giant of Provence, it is the culmination of the Monts du Vaucluse, the ultimate link of the Southern Alps and the highest peak of Vaucluse. Its geographical isolation makes it visible over great distances. 

Mont Ventoux is as well the linguistic border between the north and south-Occitan.

Its mainly calcareous nature is responsible, in its top part, its deep white color in every season and intense karstification due to erosion by water, with the presence of numerous scree on the south face. Precipitation is particularly abundant in spring and fall. Rainwater seeps into galleries and reflects the level of the variable flow resurgences such as Fontaine de Vaucluse or Source du Groseau.

Mont Ventoux is subject to a Mediterranean dominant weather, sometimes causing scorching temperatures during summer, the altitude offering a wide variety of climates, to the top (continental influence of mountain type), through a temperate climate (mid-slopes). In addition, the north wind can be very violent and the Mistral blows almost half part of the year. 

This particular geomorphology and climate make it a rich and fragile environmental site consisting of many levels of vegetation. It is s a biosphere reserve by UNESCO and Natura 2000 site.

If human settlements are found in the foothills in prehistoric times, the first ascent to the summit would work on 26 April 1336, the poet Petrarch from Malaucène on the northern slope. It opens the way later in numerous scientific studies. 

Thereafter, for nearly six centuries, Mont Ventoux has been intensely deforested to provide the shipbuilding in Toulon, charcoal manufacturers and sheep farmers. During World War II, the mountain is home to the Ventoux maquis, the french Resistance against Nazis.

Since 1966, the summit is topped with an observation tower over forty meters high topped by a TV and satellite antenna. 

While sheep farming has almost disappeared, beekeeping, gardening (especially cherries), viticulture, harvesting of mushrooms including truffles and, to a lesser extent,  lavender, are still practiced.

Mont Ventoux is an important symbolic figure of Provence that fed oral or literary works and artistic performances or pictorial map. It is represented since 1445 in the famous Pieta d'Avignon  by Engurerant Quarton, where one can see it painted on the right, behind Mary Magdalene weeping at the feet of Christ (see picture above)

Before being covered by three main roads, which enabled the development of green tourism and outdoor sports both in summer and winter in particular with the organization of major cycling races, motor cars and other challenges, mountain was crisscrossed by sheep tracks traced by shepherds as a result of the growth of sheep between the fourteenth century and the mid-nineteenth century. These roads have now been turned into hiking trails, like the GR 4 and GR 9.

The painter 

Jules-Joseph-Augustin Laurens, commonly known as Jules Laurens, was a French artist in drawing, painting, and lithography born in Provence and remembered, above all, for his Orientalist works.

At the age of 12, he went to live with his brother, Jean-Joseph (1801–1890) in Montpellier where he attended the city's art college while benefitting from his brother's artistic contacts. He went on to Paris, studying under Paul Delaroche at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, first exhibiting in 1840 and completing his studies in 1846. Chosen by the geographer Xavier Hommaire de Hell to join him on an extended scientific journey to Turkey and Persia, Laurens made over a thousand drawings of the sites, costumes and people he encountered on his travels. They included many portraits of Persian personalities. Hundreds of his drawings were presented in the Atlas historique et scientifique, the fourth volume of the Voyage en Turquie et en Perse published by de Hell's wife. Some of Laurens' lithographs were published in L'Illustration and Tour du Monde, both popular periodicals, while the originals, together with his early watercolours were given to the library of the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. Laurens also painted examples of qajar art while in Persia, including his Danseuse au tambourin.

Laurens continued his career in France after returning in 1849, exhibiting paintings and engravings in virtually every Salon from 1850 to 1891. He was also active in literary circles where he met many celebrities. His La Légende des ateliers, published in his later days, contains anecdotes of his travels.

Ref: 

Jules Laurens Biography