Rembrandt Bugatti

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The youngest son of Carlo, Rembrandt , born October 16th 1884 in Milan (Italy), is without any doubts the most gifted one of this artistic family.  His animal sculptures reveal an extraordinary talent and are very much in demand today. Unfortunately, Rembrandt suffers all his life from precarious health and from unstable psychological make up which pushed him to commit suicide January 8th 1916, only 31 years of age.

His first name is chosen by his uncle, the painter Giovanni Seguantini, " to encourage the fate ". In his family, his nickname is Pempa. Like Ettore , the childhood of Rembrandt is amidst the artistic and non-conformist surroundings of the Bugatti family, in contrast to this his mother, Teresa , reflects on him the frustrations of her youth due to a fragile health aggravated by the difficult birth of Rembrandt. Hardly 30 years old, Teresa is obliged to leave and to lead a very quiet and out-of-the-way life, and her bitterness will not stop growing. In spite of the very hard attitude of his mother to him, Rembrandt will stay during his all life a loving and respectful son, but will psychologically be marked in life by this lack of affection.

Rembrandt, from his youngest age, dreams to become a train driver and his father directs him to an engineer's career. He lets him work in his workshop to teach him to use his hands. Rembrandt is only 14 years old in 1899 when his father Carlo and sculptor Troubetzkoï discover in the workshop a still wet sculpture representing a farmer leading cows by a rope. Both men are dazzled by the artistic quality of this sculpture that is the very first work known of Rembrandt. On the recommendations of Troubetzkoï, Rembrandt enters the Brera Academy of Milan where he quickly acquires the reputation of an exceptionally gifted pupil. Ettore had discovered before the others the gifts of his brother, because he had left the same academy one year earlier, when he noticed that Rembrandt was much more endowed than him ...

On September 29th, 1899, his uncle Giovanni Segantini dies and Rembrandt is very marked by this disappearance. He also suffers from his physical appearance : he is very tall (1.93 m), endowed with an unusual force, lanky and decked out by a head quite in length with a prominent forehead. This uncommunicative and taciturn teenager takes refuge in work and produces numerous works between 1900 and 1903. In 1903, 18-year-old, he exhibits for the first time to the Biennial of Art in Venice, where he will also exhibit in 1907, 1909, 1910 and 1914. Then he exhibits in Turin and Milan, and becomes a member of the National Society of Fine Arts in Paris.

An important turn takes place in his life in 1904, when he follows Carlo and Teresa to Paris where they settle down at rue Jeanne d'Arc in the 13th arrondissement. His father sold his Milanese workshop of furniture manufacture, very attracted by France and by artistic brilliance of Paris. Rembrandt often goes to the Garden of Plants because of the animals which are kept here and which he uses as models. Adrien-Aurelien Hebrard , director of the Hebrard gallery, 8 rue Royale in Paris, and owner of the famous Art foundry which bears his name then contacts him. On July 22nd, 1904, Hebrard has him sign a temporary contract of pre-emption. As he made it 2 years earlier for Ettore with the de Dietrich contract, Carlo Bugatti has to countersign the contract with Hebrard because Rembrandt is still minor. A contract of exclusivity will be signed on one year later, on July 10th, 1905, also countersigned by Carlo.

This period 1904-1905 is fertile, Rembrandt realises hundred of works which will be sold by Hebrard in his gallery where he exhibits regularly. Rembrandt complains nevertheless to have become a " sculptor of bourgeois living-room " and to be forced to supply works of small size that are well sold. He also exhibits the same year of 1904 in annual Show of National Society of Fine Arts in Paris, of which he was a member since 1903. It is also during this year of 1904 that he sculptures his famous " standing playing Elephant ", which will be slightly modified and melted in silver 24 years later to serve as radiator mascot to famous Bugatti Type 41, the Royale, conceived by Ettore in 1928.

In 1905, Rembrandt exhibits for the first time at the Autumn Show, at Grand Palais near Champs Elysees in Paris. He notably presents there two remarkable works, existing only in a single copy: " Ten minutes of rest " and " The horse market ". He will exhibit almost every year to the Autumn Show until 1916. Doubtless always hung up by his physical appearance, Rembrandt gives evidence of an extreme clothing elegance and, as his father Carlo, draws himself his clothes. This aesthetic research and this elegance are a constant in the family, Ettore not being in rest, far needs ...

In 1906, Rembrandt goes alongside to the painter Modigliani, to the poet Guillaume Apollinaire and to the great painter Andre Derain who will become much more later a friend and a faithful customer of Ettore Bugatti. He sculptures this year more than thirty works, of which near half represent feminine nudes. Rembrandt has just lived the happiest years of his life, in Paris. His works are well sold, even if the contract signed with Hebrard leaves him only crumbs on the sales income, but he always lives at his parent's and has no financial problems.

In 1907, he is invited by the Royal Society of Zoology in Antwerp and leave to settle down in Belgium. This institution welcomes every year young sculptors by organising exhibitions and sales of their works. As invited, Rembrandt can reach freely the Zoo of Antwerp, largest one in Europe in the time. A workshop is given to the artists, but they have to pay themselves their flat. Rembrandt is very warmly welcomed in the family of France's General Consul in Antwerp, François Crozier. He exhibits at the Spring Show of " The Free Aesthetics " in Brussels where he meets a wide success.

During these 7 years in Belgium, between 1907 and 1914, Rembrandt works enormously, spending most of his time at the Zoo and in his workshop situated Remparts des Beguines street. If he goes alongside to numerous young artists as Alberic Collin, Edward Deckers, Isidore Opsomer or still Walter Vaes , Rembrandt always remains so solitary, uncommunicative and few comfortable in social gatherings. Rembrandt begins to meet with financial problems, his large generosity for his friends and his clothes expenses not being foreign to it. When he is really in the need, he appeals in spite of his hesitations to his brother Ettore.

He often goes in Paris to control the moulds of his bronzes at Hebrard, and frequents Pablo Picasso, Max Jacob, Andre Derain, Maurice de Vlaminck and Andre Salmon . But he begins to loose interest in the marketing of his works and prefers to exhibit in Belgium, in Brussels in 1908 and 1910, and in Liege in 1909. His health aggravates : he suffers from violent coughs and is going to take exams in Paris. The doctor's diagnosis is without appeal : he contracted tuberculosis . In December 1909, Ettore Bugatti has just created his motorcars factory and settled down in a luxurious villa, he urges all his family to spend Christmas at Molsheim. In spite of his tuberculosis, Rembrandt goes to it and will even manage to accommodate his tall carcass in the Type 10, the first Pur-Sang created by his brother.

In June 1910, Rembrandt exhibits at Royal Society of Zoology in Antwerp. Critics are unanimous and praise to the skies this young artist (he is only 26 years old). On March 22nd 1911, France promotes him to the rank of Chevalier of Legion of Honour, upon request of Hebrard. Years follow each other and are alike : Rembrandt always feels the same evil to live, we do not know him feminine conquest, he is more and more solitary. Even the successes of his exhibitions do not manage to take him out of his disastrous psychological state. During year 1912, he writes this letter in Italian to his brother Ettore whom he likes, in spite of their so different characters :

My dear Totor,
I am satisfied that you give me of your news. I never write you because I have nothing new to tell. Year is as month, takes place; month as days; days as hours which follow each other, monotonous, without enjoyment nor pleasure.
Yes, I still have moments of happiness by thinking of the success of my work that I begin and which will occupy me during three or four years before seeing the end. I hope and I believe to have managed to make a work that no former or modern animal sculptor made. You can have my workshop when you want it and for the time which you will want. I am amazed about the bust of the Prince, it has been quite a while since it is made, and you can say to him for me, to go to ask for it and it has been quite a while since there is nothing to pay out. I shall ask you for something, mom had to say it to you, because I wrote her finally ! I do not deceive your kindness and I give up asking to you for it still.
On October 16th, drink to my health and think of me this day, I should be less alone. Here, it's as if I was in a desert between savages. My consolation, it is the zoo where I spend all my days.
Kiss all my little nephews, your wife, and you.
Your brother, Pempa

In November 1913, the famous art critic Andre Salmon publishes a long and laudatory article about Rembrandt's work in the monthly review "Art and Decoration". During this time, Rembrandt is in the grip of more and more frequent problems of health and of disastrous financial situation. In the year 1913, he writes this letter, in French, to his brother Ettore :

My dear Ettore,
I write you it some words not with the idea to exploit you : it is in a moment of discouragement that I write you. Since I was here in Antwerp, my life did not change. At first it amused me but now this life demoralises me. Think that for 8 years I am accommodated in a room for 40 Francs a month, I eat in another pension, and pay, to rest or shelter me when it is raining, a workshop that I am satisfied when I am not there because it has 2.80 m on 9.80 m. It makes for it wet and that stinks of the mould.
Of these three places of residence, I am never fixed to it in nowhere more than one hour because I work on the garden. My dream, it is to have a place where I can rest after my workday outdoors which is not always pleasant. I saw for a long time a large workshop that is for rent. I see the possibility of living in also but for that I have to make come back from Paris all my belongings. For it you know what is needed when we have nothing. I decide to ask you for the necessary because I learn that you are the owner of the Three Hinds bronze. It cost to me three working months and 800 Francs of cast iron paid to Hebrard, for it I ask you 1 000 Francs. With that I can settle down and live here another 3 years. Otherwise I could not like it any more. Write me immediately as soon as you receive this letter because I have to give an affirmative word or not to the building owner. You write me not rather often. You are not kind, all, you leave me very lonely. My sister-in-law Rina can indeed give me news from time to time. How are the kids and your health all, is it good ? Mine, thanks to God, is the least bad.
I kiss you all.
Pempa

In 1914, it is the war. Rembrandt, not being mobilizable as a foreigner, undertakes as voluntary stretcher-bearer in a Belgian section of Red Cross established in the Zoo of Antwerp. City undergoes heavy bombardments, victims are uncountable and Rembrandt carries out its task with a heroism that will be worth to him being named Honour's Citizen by the city of Antwerp. It is interesting to note that his father Carlo will have the same heroic behaviour at the same moment in Pierrefonds. But the war horrors are too difficult to bear for Rembrandt in his already fragile psychological condition and he obtains, at the time of the collapse at the end of 1914, thanks to his friend François Crozier, France's General Consul in Antwerp, a safe-conduct which allows him to join Italy via the Holland. He spends some months in Milan at his sister Deanice (to whom Ettore also left his family) and tries to be incorporated into the army of his native country. But his age group is not mobilizable and he settles down in Paris in autumn 1915, first of all Magdebourg street, then in a workshop situated Joseph Bara street in Montparnasse.

In spite of the war, and doubtless to forget all the horrors of which he was the witness, Rembrandt recovers in the work. Ettore also settled down in Paris, in his apartment situated 20 Boissière street, but he works intensively on the creation of his plane engines, 8 then 16 cylinders, intended for the allied Forces. In spite of their nearness, they see each other very little. Rembrandt sculptures then for the Count de Gramont a life-size Christ, the "Crucifixion", which will be at the same time its masterpiece and one of its last works.

On Saturday, January 8th, 1916, 31-year-old, Rembrandt Bugatti ends his days poisoning itself by city gas, having attended same morning a mass in the Madeleine Church in Paris. We find him in his Montparnasse workshop, spread on his bed in a irreproachable dress of holiday. A bouquet of violets and two letters are put on his bedside table : one for the chief constable of the district, the other one for his brother Ettore. He dies after his transfer at the Laennec hospital. In spite of his suicide, Catholic Church authorises religious funeral service in the Saint Germain des Pres church. He will be interred in the family vault of Dorlisheim, very close from Molsheim.

His last work, representing a lioness crushing a snake, will be signed by Ettore Bugatti with the sentence : " last work of my brother - Paris January 8th, 1916 ". At the request of Ettore, Albino Palazzolo, the Milanese foundry Master of Hebrard who had been engaged thanks to Rembrandt, executes a death mask of Rembrandt, which today is at the Orsay Museum in Paris.

Works of Rembrandt Bugatti appear today in greatest private Collections and in largest world-wide Museums.

Self-portrait of Rembrandt Bugatti, near 1905 Photographic portrait of Rembrandt Bugatti, probably near 1906 - 1908 Very nice photographic portrait of Rembrandt Bugatti, in 1902 at Milan Always of a perfect clothing elegance, as his father Carlo and his brother Ettore, Rembrandt Bugatti often drew himself its clothes Rembrandt Bugatti in the Zoo of Antwerp in 1907, sculpturing one of its works in front of his model ... Rembrandt Bugatti exhibits at the Royal Society of Zoology of Antwerp in 1910 Rembrandt Bugatti in Antwerp Zoo in 1907 Rembrandt Bugatti in the Zoo of Antwerp, feeding a fawn. Behind him, his models in plaster. Unknown date (c. 1908-1910) Rembrandt Bugatti in the Zoo of Antwerp in 1909, together with a stork Rembrandt Bugatti (to the right) with friends in the Zoo of Antwerp in 1908 Rembrandt Bugatti in front of one of its most former known sculptures : " Return from the meadow " Rembrandt Bugatti in Paris in 1907, in Josue Dupon's workshop, in front of its famous sculpture: " Standing fighter " Bronze of Rembrandt Bugatti: " standing playing Elephant " - 1904 Will serve as model for the mascot of radiator of Type 41 Royale in 1928 Mascot of radiator of Type 41 Royale 1928, of silver, on the model of a sculpture of Rembrandt Bugatti : " standing playing Elephant " realised in 1904 One of the rare sculptures of feminine nude realised by Rembrandt Bugatti : “ Phryne ” - 1906 Same year, 1906, for this other one feminine nude realised by Rembrandt Bugatti Slept panther - 1904 Couple of walking panthers - 1904 Nude atlhet in the rest - 1907 Begging white elephant - 1908 Dog and two puppies between its paws - 1908 Squatted jaguar - 1908 Great royal tiger - 1913 Walking panther - 1909         Faculty-simile of Rembrandt Bugatti's signature and of Hebrard Foundry stamp Poster of Rembrandt Bugatti exhibition at the Royal Society of Zoology in Antwerp in May-June, 1910 (illustrated by a self-portrait) Extract from a handwritten letter sent in 1911 by Rembrandt Bugatti to his brother Ettore : " Be horrid to people, kind to your wife, God with your children, and good with animals, your brother who kisses all of you with all his soul " Death mask of Rembrandt Bugatti realised at the request of Ettore by sculptor Albino Palazzolo, Hebrard's forge Master, on January 8th, 1916

Sources :
- L’Adieu à Bugatti - Patrice de Meritens - Editions Albin Michel - Paris - 2000
- Bugatti, les meubles, les sculptures, les autos - E.L.A. La Différence / Galerie Beaubourg - Paris - 1995
- Die Bugattis - Museum fur Kunst und Gewerbe - Hamburg - 1983
- Les Bugatti d’Alain Delon - Les Editions de l’Amateur - Paris - 1988