Pair of Art Nouveau Decorative Panels with Purple and Yellow Irises, Circa 1900

Each panel features a shaped reserve on a light ground within which a bouquet of irises blossoms, treated as a frieze: yellow and orange irises with long ribbon-like leaves on one, purple irises against a sketched landscape on the other. The painting, applied in soft touches on a laid-down canvas, plays on gentle tones — water green, cream, mauve — characteristic of the mural decoration of the period. The original moulded pitch pine frames underline the frieze format. The iris is one of the emblematic flowers of Art Nouveau, celebrated by the decorators and glassmakers of the École de Nancy as well as by the Parisian ornamental painters. These panels, most likely from a panelled scheme or overdoors around 1900, offer a testimony full of freshness. Condition report: Good general condition given the age. Canvases showing craquelure, rubbing and visible marks of time, original frames with wear; the whole retains an authentic and highly decorative patina. A pair full of poetry, to be arranged as pendants above doors, a bed or a sideboard.