In 1901, Alexandre Bernheim, with his sons, Josse (1870–1941), and Gaston (1870–1953), organized the first important exhibition of Vincent van Gogh paintings in Paris with the help of art criticJulien Leclercq.[3]
From 1906 to 1925, art critic Félix Fénéon was the director of the gallery and was instrumental in bringing in the art of Georges Seurat and Umberto Boccioni.[4] The gallery became one of the centers of the artistic avant-garde. In 1906, the gallery also began publishing monographs; its first release was devoted to the paintings of Eugène Carrière. In 1919 it also launched a bimonthly bulletin about artistic life.
The son of Gaston and Suzanne Bernheim, Claude Bernheim dit Bernheim de Villers (September 15, 1902 – 1944), was arrested and deported in 1943 to his death at Auschwitz.[20]
Postwar
After the death in 2012 of Michel Dauberville, descendant of Bernheim, his cousin Guy-Patrice Dauberville, also an expert in modern paintings and a Bonnard and Renoir specialist, started heading Bernheim-Jeune.
In 2022, Maurice Utrillo's "Carrefour à Sannois" which had been looted in 1940 during the Nazi occupation of France from a cousin of Josse and Gaston Bernheim-Jeune, Georges Bernheim,[21] was restituted to the heirs after a long legal battle. The city of Sannois (Val-d'Oise) had bought the painting at Sotheby's in 2004. In 2015 the Commission responsible for dealing with Nazi looted art (the CIVS) advised the town that the painting had been looted. A new law voted by France's National Assembly in 2022 paved the way for restitution.[22][23][24]
Gallery closing
In 2018, the Bernheim-Jeune website announced the gallery would be closing.[25]
Gallery
Pierre Bonnard (1867–1947) Bernheim-Jeune - Musée d'Orsay Paris
Bernheim-Jeune exhibition of Impressionists, April 1903
Édouard Vuillard, The Art Dealers - The Bernheim-Jeune Brothers - (1912)
^"Fermeture de la galerie Bernheim-Jeune". Le Journal Des Arts (in French). Retrieved 2022-02-17. L'une des plus anciennes galeries de Paris vient de fermer ses portes. Les dirigeants de la société cessent leur activité de marchand d'art.
^"Claude-Bernheim-de-Villers". ajpn.org. Retrieved 2022-02-17. En 1943, Claude Bernheim de Villers, âgé de 41 ans, est arrêté parce que Juif et déporté sans retour par le convoi n° 64 du 7 décembre 1943 vers Auschwitz.
^"fermeture". Bernheim-Jeune. Retrieved 2018-10-18. "Nous avons le regret d'annoncer la fermeture de la galerie Bernheim-Jeune. Les études d'œuvres attribuées à Renoir ou à Bonnard continuent." Translation to English, "We regret to announce the closure of the Bernheim-Jeune gallery. The studies of works attributed to Renoir or Bonnard continue."