Sounds almost Lovecraftian...
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/07/12/PK3D18HLID.DTL&type=movies
She eked out a living cleaning houses in a French village by day and painted furiously by night. Then Séraphine Louis went insane. Before being institutionalized, the self-taught artist created a vivid body of work including pieces that are now housed in the permanent collection of New York's Museum of Modern Art. Filmmaker Martin Provost tells the story in "Séraphine," starring Yolande Moreau in the title role.
Provost had never heard of Louis until a friend mentioned the artist to him. "Séraphine became an obsession as I read everything I could find on the Internet and saw some puzzling paintings. It was enough to trigger my curiosity." says Provost. "Some call it 'naive' art, or 'art brut' or 'outsider art,' but to me that's just a question of categories. I've always been drawn to the pure creative burst."
Before Louis was discovered in 1913 by art dealer Wilhelm Uhde (Ulrich Ukur), she had to scrounge for materials, Provost says. "Séraphine stole oil from the lamps dedicated to the Virgin Mary in the cathedral to mix with her paint. I also received a letter from a man in Senlis whose great-grandfather was a butcher and had employed Séraphine. He remembered that she took blood from the shop to use as paint."
http://www.theage.com.au/news/enter...brush-with-fame/2009/02/26/1235237812504.html
In 1912, Wilhelm Uhde, a German art critic and dealer, is renting an apartment whose owner, Madame Duphot, employs Seraphine as a maid. One night, at dinner, Uhde spots a small painting of a bunch of flowers.
Madame Duphot is dismissive — it is by her cleaner, after all — but Uhde, knowing a masterpiece when he sees one, is captivated; he befriends Seraphine and buys her small stock of paintings. It is the beginning of a professional association that, despite separation through times of war, continued to the early 1930s, resulting in many important works.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/07/12/PK3D18HLID.DTL&type=movies
She eked out a living cleaning houses in a French village by day and painted furiously by night. Then Séraphine Louis went insane. Before being institutionalized, the self-taught artist created a vivid body of work including pieces that are now housed in the permanent collection of New York's Museum of Modern Art. Filmmaker Martin Provost tells the story in "Séraphine," starring Yolande Moreau in the title role.
Provost had never heard of Louis until a friend mentioned the artist to him. "Séraphine became an obsession as I read everything I could find on the Internet and saw some puzzling paintings. It was enough to trigger my curiosity." says Provost. "Some call it 'naive' art, or 'art brut' or 'outsider art,' but to me that's just a question of categories. I've always been drawn to the pure creative burst."
Before Louis was discovered in 1913 by art dealer Wilhelm Uhde (Ulrich Ukur), she had to scrounge for materials, Provost says. "Séraphine stole oil from the lamps dedicated to the Virgin Mary in the cathedral to mix with her paint. I also received a letter from a man in Senlis whose great-grandfather was a butcher and had employed Séraphine. He remembered that she took blood from the shop to use as paint."
http://www.theage.com.au/news/enter...brush-with-fame/2009/02/26/1235237812504.html
In 1912, Wilhelm Uhde, a German art critic and dealer, is renting an apartment whose owner, Madame Duphot, employs Seraphine as a maid. One night, at dinner, Uhde spots a small painting of a bunch of flowers.
Madame Duphot is dismissive — it is by her cleaner, after all — but Uhde, knowing a masterpiece when he sees one, is captivated; he befriends Seraphine and buys her small stock of paintings. It is the beginning of a professional association that, despite separation through times of war, continued to the early 1930s, resulting in many important works.
