Alfred Guillou (1844 - 1926)

It is thanks to Théphile Deyrolle and Alfred Guillou that Concarneau, a fishing port, has become one of the ports of art. Dozens of artists chose to live with them or to come regularly during the summer months in a climate that was conducive to creation.

Son of the pilot Etienne Guillou, Alfred was noticed and encouraged by the painter Lemonier. After training with the great masters of the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, Bouguereau and Cabanel, he returned to his country with a solid trade, ready to face the career of academic painters. He regularly exhibited a painting at the Salon des Artistes Français, from 1867 and especially regularly from 1881. The subjects are in the image of the academic paintings of this Salon. Thus, from 1874 to 1926, there was a succession of genre scenes illustrating life in Concarn, sometimes heroic, sometimes tragic. A very scrupulous concern for realism animates his paintings, which were produced after numerous studies. In parallel to these large compositions, Alfred Guillou, in numerous small formats, tells the story of slices of life in the city of Concarn. A painter of fishermen, he also painted some very beautiful portraits.