FRANCOIS AND ROGER LOTTE; ANOTHER SMALL FAMILYAlthough it is true that the Lottes weren't one of the most important family unit in the history of French bowmaking, they have been an integral and functional part of it and they give me food for thought.
Cello bow by Roger Francois Lotte Francois, son of Josephine and Georges Millot Lotte, a luthier who worked at first for J.B. Vuillaume and for Derazey afterwards, was born in Mirecourt on May 15, 1889. He begins his apprenticeship at C.N. Bazin's workshop, with whom he will remain until 1921, except for the years of the First World War. During the war he was taken prisoner and, for this reason, he was given the nickname "KG", which stands for Kreigsgefangener; i.e. war prisoner in German. In 1919 he marries Marguerite Ouchard, Emile Francois' daughter and Emile Auguste's sister , another example of how the bowmaker families in Mirecourt had symbiotic relationships. From 1922 to 1925, he is listed among the workers of the maison Cuniot-Hury, and here my thought begins. Last Saturday I was in Amsterdam to attend a bowmakers convention and a part of the meeting scheduled the analysis of some old bows , performed by three experts. The experiment, in addition to being funny, also brought to the surface some backgrounds of modern bowmaking. For example, I displayed a Cuniot-Hury bow , certified by M° Raffin as done in cooperation with Emile Auguste Ouchard. As soon as I told what was written on the certificate, one of my two colleagues exploded with rage saying that it was very unlikely that the collaboration had taken place since Eugène Cuniot died in 1910, three years before the thirteen years old Emile Auguste started to work. I replied him that he was right, but I pointed him out that the Maison had continued to work managed by Emile Auguste's father , and that it was probably made by him and stamped by the laboratory where he worked,considering also that he worked there until 1922. In any case, accordingly to my colleague, the certificate didn't clarify the matter in a proper way. Another Ouchard, certified as Emile Francois, opened a further case. The first one to carry out the analysis was the other colleague: - "Well,well it seem to remind Emile Francois Ouchard" -. - "How come !" - This time it was my turn to explode, - "It 's a quite gross Morizot frères rebranded" -. Deathly hush. I realized that even if I didn't make a blunder, I said something inconvenient because the bow was even certified! In a nutshell, the head of this bow, could remind Emile Francois' work , even though it was much less carefully carried out than his own, but it had a frog with Hill support (similar to Vuillaume, but with an octagonal section), used in France from the second half of 1900 by the Morizot brothers and Emile Auguste Ouchard (No comment). Too bad that Emile Francois died in 1951, probably his ghost has come back to build only this bow! However, the important thing that came out out of this comparison is that they, like me and many others, have serious doubts about the purity of some bows and some certifications that seem, at times, to favor trade a little bit too much at the expense of other things. But let's come back to Lottes. In 1926, Francois, after a short period of collaboration with his colleague Eugène Brouillier aka Victor, which ended quickly due to characterial incompatibility, settled by his own at rue Vuillaume, 63. After a few years, in 1931 he moved permanently to quai du Breuil. In 1936 the laboratory has four workers: René Bernard, Marcel Lapierre, Marcel Mangenot, and Roger Francois Lotte, who became his assistant in 1940, as well as becoming his son in 1922! In 1960, he retires at the age of 69 years , even if he kept a small working table in a corner of the laboratory, where he went every morning until March 21, 1970, date of his death. On May 5, 1922 the only son of Francois, who will become a luthier, Roger Francois, is born. After finishing his school, he starts to work with his father becoming his right-hand man. At the beginning he builds in his father's style , and in this period he also begins to mount frogs semi-finished by Roger Gérome and Louis Desiré Jeandel. After his father's death, he takes over the shop and remains there working with René Bernard as a worker who will assist him until the end of his career. He is a worker of impressive speed, he has built a large number of bows, stamped with both his name and rebranded by others, such as Etienne Vatelot, Bernard Millant, Hilaire & Apparut, just to name a few. He, too, dies with the plane in his hand, on November 13, 1989.
Violin bow by Francois Lotte The style Speaking about style, I come back to what I wrote above. The bows of this period are difficult to allocate and, often, even the experts make mistakes. In particular, these families, such as Morizots or Lottes, have worked hard both for themselves and for others, so the result is a review of the stylistic in vogue at the time, much less careful and refined than the original ones. Of course, we owe the utmost respect to work, especially the hard one, but to be honest I can say that with Morizots and Lottes, without neglecting Lapierre, the French bowmaking has reached the lowest point in its history, luckily there was Bernard Ouchard. References: CHARLES NICOLAS BAZIN; THE FOUNDER THE OUCHARDS AND THE GRAIL QUEST EMILE AUGUSTE OUCHARD; THE BOWMAKER OF TWO WORLDS EUGENE CUNIOT, AKA "CUNIOT-HURY" ONE, NO ONE AND ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND MORIZOT BROTHERS AND THE SUPER HEROES BERNARD OUCHARD, THE HUMBLE EDUCATOR So long Paolo
|
   |
