Paysages monstrueux, N° 8, 1920 (aluminium panels)

Parallel to his work as a doctor, embraced by family obligation but which he did not appreciate, Léopold Chauveau took refuge as a self-taught artist in a strange artistic universe, as singular as it was original. At once a sculptor, illustrator and author of books for adults and children, he was long forgotten by art history, before a donation from his grandson to the Musée d'Orsay in 2017 (18 sculptures and 100 drawings) brought his name back into the limelight. An atypical personality, Chauveau was introduced to sculpture around 1905 when he had been practising medicine for several years. From 1907 onwards, monsters became a leitmotif of his production, in both sculpture and drawing. Hybrid, his creatures are often endearing, clumsy and as if surprised by their own presence. Seeming to come out of his unconscious, they constitute for Chauveau real companions, the people of an imaginary world in which he would find refuge.