Gaston Hoffmann (1883-1977) HOFFMANN

In “L'Enfer” (Hell)
Gaston Hoffmann, the artist adopts a caricatural approach, accentuating grotesque deformities to depict the horror and suffering of the afterlife.

The work is a disorienting and explosive vision of hell, populated by human and animal creatures in exaggerated, almost caricatural postures that capture the violence and depravity of the human soul.

The bodies are distorted to the extreme, with some characters having elongated, twisted, or disproportionate limbs. These deformations aim to intensify the effect of suffering and terror, while illustrating the loss of all human dignity in a place of damnation.

Hoffmann's work can be compared to certain paintings by Hieronymus Bosch, in particular his triptych “The Garden of Earthly Delights.”

HOFFMANN Gaston 1883-1977

His mother was from Lorraine, and he lived in Metz and studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris in 1902, where he was a student of Léon Bonnat and Luc-Olivier Merson. at the Académie Julian of Jules Lefebvre (for engraving) and T. Robert-Fleury, at the Beaux-Arts in Nancy, he was a student of Jules Larcher.

Gaston Hoffmann exhibited regularly at the Salon des Artistes Français from 1905 onwards, as well as at the Salon des Comiques.

In 1918, G. Hoffmann collaborated with Charles Schneider, a friend he met at the Beaux-Arts, whose Épinay-sur-Seine glassworks took off with the École de Nancy and enjoyed great success in the 1920s.

In 1922-1923, G. Hoffmann worked for the Manufacture de Sèvre. That same year, he designed the poster for the film Vidocq.

In 1925, the artist decorated the murals of the Kerhulu restaurant in Quebec City: La Faim et la Soif (Hunger and Thirst). These works are now preserved at the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, thanks to a donation by Jean Piché in 1983.

He became a drawing teacher for the City of Paris.
He taught drawing and decorative composition at the École des Beaux-Arts in Quebec City from 1924 to 1926.