How Eugénie Dubreuil rewritten female art

En This afternoon in 1999, she contemplates the honeycomb facade of the Drouot hotel, near the great Parisian boulevards, without imagining that she will become a collector of art . At 62, Eugénie Dubreuil, Square blur, rings with all the fingers and countless wristbralets, rather made the bohemian heroine of Jeanne Moreau’s song think, The whirlwind of life. The freshly retired drawing teacher attended the auction of the Guillaume Apollinaire fund, whose poetry fascinates her. It follows the presentation of the first lots carefully, but without stir.

Until she stops in front of a sketch of the writer’s partner, Marie Laurencin: Naked woman half-body, painting herself (1909) . The study of notebook, unfinished and not signed, could well go unnoticed and remain in its means. What affects this connoisseur is the repentant of what looks like a feverish quest for style, the face holding the African mask and the arms of Egyptian mural. Everything takes place in a flash. The price is announced. Without thinking too much, she raises her hand. In a few minutes, the auctioneer pronounces the decisive formula: “3,000 francs (the equivalent of 600 euros), once, twice, awarded to Madame! The hammer falls and Eugenie’s heart overflows. The one who devoted her master’s thesis to Apollinaire and the futurists is struck: how the poet, also a critic of art, was able to blacken pages on an Italian avant-garde current and commit only a psychologizing article on his talented lover?

The spark is on. Eugénie Dubreuil is caught up in the game, as in the casino. It sets a ceiling of 100 to 600 euros per room and peeles the Drouot catalogs. In the sales room, she knows why she is there, aware that she will not necessarily win every time. Little by little, she focuses on the works of women who then count on the fingers of the hand. In 2004, she made one of her most precious conquests: a charcoal by Louise Michel, The Pouffart family: His Highness the Polish prince with the clothes of the internal of the House of Health (1884). The leader of the commune of Paris, treated with hysterical by her opponents, conjures her fear of madness there, through a character of walker, hands in the pockets, hair in the wind, that one looks like a poem by Rimbaud.

Beyond the auctions, Eugénie recovers luck . In an antique dealer, the gold researcher found, in 2008, a sculpture of Rosa Bonheur. This Sheep lying (1845-1846), presented on a molded wooden base, reminds him of grandmother’s chimney decorations. Nevertheless. Rosa Bonheur is already a reference in terms of animal representation, so she buys it. His treasure still expands, according to exchanges with his plastic friends. A day of collective exhibition, she receives Three oval portraits (2010), shot by Marie-Martine Expilly, against a small mermaid that she herself produced according to the draft of Marie Laurencin.

Each expedition, Eugenie fetches her desire, not of possession, but discovery . She learns from everything, especially from her failures. In a decade, the rating of women rose. In Drouot, when the auctioneer questions: “Who for this portrait of a 16th century Spanish court lady, signed Sofonisba Anguissola? “, She manifests herself with eagerness, but is no longer the only one. Very quickly, the wonderful oil on wood flies to several thousand euros and escapes it. Rage! Back home, in peace, she begins to search on the Internet and in her great Dictionary Bénézit des Artistes to learn more about this Italian painter, attached to Queen Isabelle de Valois, who excelled to make the interiority of her models. And… ends up retracing his destiny in a comic. From each figure she tries to include in her collection, she learns a new lesson, creativity and humanity.

From the start of her business, the clearing is happy to share her nuggets . Native of Brive-la-Gaillarde (Corrèze) but Parisian adoption, she organizes open days in her workshop in the 13th arrondissement. His acquisitions are simply arranged in the middle of his own production: landscapes, surreal collages or folded books. Each is accompanied by a detailed sheet. While she was not expecting it, one of her sisters, ex-militant in May 1968, exclaims: “With your 100 % female presentation, you put us back in the ghetto! We have struggled so long to be exposed with men… ”She understands, but maintains her course that she believes the good.

In the early 2010s, Eugénie Dubreuil realized that she was a collection worthy of the name. Besides, she is looking for one. Her husband Georges Châtain, ex-journalist at World And poet, launches him like a joke: “What if you called him the museum?” Neologism is immediately adopted. It’s still a little vague, but the pioneer caresses the dream of opening her own private center, in the spirit of the National Museum of Women in the Arts of Washington, in the United States. She is thinking of developing her house in Menoux, in Indre, still locates other buildings on real estate ads, publishes booklets and postcards. But time catches up with it. At almost 80 years old, it seems unrealistic to tackle, alone, to such a pharaonic project. He would need a second life …

In the absence of reincarnation, the only solution to preserve all of its 523 pieces seems to him the gift to an institution . But what she was taking for a formality turns into an obstacle course. It calls on the town halls of the east of the capital, rich in galleries, then the Ile-de-France suburbs truffled with workshops, Gentilly (Val-de-Marne), Malakoff (Hauts-de-Seine) … None feels ready to assume such a gift. The Corrézienne ends up addressing her original city, Brive-la-Gaillarde. His family cradle refuses because he holds few works by women, but reorients him to the Sainte-Croix Museum in Poitiers (Vienne), in a point on the subject since the 1980s. There, in 2022, the conservative Raphaële Martin-Pigalle said yes. Eugenie first believes hear badly. Huge indescribable relief and joy! In March 2024, the acquisition was ratified.

It remains to orchestrate a large exhibition entitled “La Musée: a collection of women’s artists” . The donor especially wants to renew the panorama of creation, from the 17th century to the present day. In November 2024, during the assembly, Manon Lecaplain and Camille Belvèze, the two commissioners of 30 and 31 years old who took over the torch, grant his wish and go even beyond. Over the chronological course, they add a sociological focus which questions the biases of a patriarchal society having oriented women towards certain genres: miniature, print, photography … It is, for them, the best way to defuse criticism on the scarcity of large formats as paintings. Faced with the 300 selected works, Camille is sure of her fact. The little bronze of the Swedish Ruth Milles, Young Breton Or Young Dutchman, seems emblematic of this injustice. So fine features, such a sparkling gilding … And yet the sculptor (1873-1941), renowned in France during her lifetime, was erased from art history works.

On December 5, 2024, it was the inauguration of the retrospective at the Sainte-Croix Museum and the time of truth. Large signatures shine on the picture rails, like the impressionist Berthe Morisot, with Cat girl (1889), tender engraving of his little Julie. Or the plastic artist Niki de Saint Phalle and his Borrego Desert (1985), multicolored screen printing of a Californian landscape. But most of the personalities highlighted are unknown to the general public. Hélène, ex-instructor, puts on her glasses to find, in the course booklet, the name of the author of a drawing on dance. “” Number 46, Ludmila Tcherina, 1950s. It’s crazy how, in a few pure lines, she suggests the movement! She blows to her companion.

Eugénie cannot be returned. She did all this to respond a posteriori to her colleagues who, In the 1970s, annoyed by his feminist paintings on the bandaged feet of the Chinese or the inflatable dolls, had challenged him to quote genius creators and had left her speechless. Today, visitors of all ages come to thank her, sometimes on the verge of tears. The one that her mother called “lynx eye” when she was a scout to the scouts of France was able to perceive a hidden world. By her action as a collector, she provides proof of what women are able to achieve. Like the one who guided her first pencil strokes, Anna Garcin-Mayade. This resistant had survived the Ravensbrück concentration camp with the hope of testifying thanks to the drawing.

At the beginning of spring, the demonstration always makes a strong impression, including the young generations . Marion and Rose, who soon pass their aesthetic professional baccalaureate, end their visit. At the request of their French teacher, both chose a work that speaks to them. For Marion, to whom her false stunned eyelashes give bambi tunes, it is a black and white photograph of Isabelle Adjani (1979) by Alice Springs. “I was harassed in college and I find that this actress with a piercing gaze is a model of self-assertion,” she explains to her teacher. Rose, pretty blonde with arched eyebrows and terra-cotta lips, opted for a more peaceful variant, Wing 04 by Patricia Van (1999), the cliché of almost naked beauty but endowed with wings, in the middle of an landing track: “I who hide me under makeup and clothes, I admire this woman who dares to show herself, without artifices. One day I would like to express my share of freedom. »»

With modesty, Eugénie defines her collection, as large and rare as it is, as a simple chapter in our history. A stage on the path of equality between men and women. The experimenter, who founded in 2000 the collective La République des Artistes with the ceramist Pierre Digan and graphic designer Rémy Pénard, is portrayed as the link in a chain. For her acquisitions, she believes that she benefited from the taste of the previous owners and the work of the auctioneers. After her, the conservatives of the Sainte-Croix museum will rely on this exhibition-manifestal to integrate more and more women’s works with the permanent journey. Thus, the Sheep lying De Rosa Bonheur will join the animal sculptures from the same period of Antoine-Louis Bare. Eugenie’s fight has found its extension: replace the human in the living.