Louis Jules DUMOULIN (1860-1924), Rue au Japon

Louis Jules DUMOULIN (1860-1924)

French painter considered during his lifetime to be a landscape painter and a major representative of the panorama phenomenon.

He was also a travelling painter.

He made his first major trip outside Europe in 1888 on an official mission to Japan ordered by the Ministry of Public Education.

On his return to Paris in 1889, he exhibited around a hundred paintings inspired by his trip, which, in addition to Japan, took him to China, Indochina and Malaysia, at the Galerie Georges Petit.

Eleven of Dumoulin's paintings from this exhibition (including seven on the theme of Japan) were selected by the Société nationale des beaux-arts for its 1890 Salon5.

Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890) saw this exhibition and was impressed by Dumoulin's paintings.
In a correspondence with his brother Theo that included two letters, he expressed his desire to meet Dumoulin (whom he wrote as "Desmoulins") as "the man who made Japan".

Two of his Japanese-themed paintings, inspired by photographs collected during his trip, were acquired by the French government and are now housed in the Musée Guimet in Paris.