Paul Bilhaud
Paul Bilhaud was a French playwright and librettist. An old friend of the author Alphonse Allais, he is remembered along his friend as a forerunner of minimalism with his painting Combat de nègres pendant la nuit, displayed for the first time in 1882, more than thirty years before the Black Square by Kazimir Malevich. It had been missing since that time until it was rediscovered in a private collection in 2017–2018. It has been classified as a National Treasure by the French state. Bilhaud was not the first to create an all-black artwork: for example, Robert Fludd published an image of "Darkness" in his 1617 book on the origin and structure of the cosmos; and Bertall published his black Vue de La Hogue in 1843. Inspired by Bilhaud, Alphonse Allais proposed other monochrome paintings, published in his Album primo-avrilesque in 1897.
Works
Theatre
- La Première Querelle, domestic scene, éditions Barbré, 1881, a play created at the Théâtre du Gymnase, 1 September 1881.
- La Soirée du seize, comedy de salon in one act, éditions Librairie théâtrale, 1884.
- Première ivresse créée à l’Odéon, 22 September 1885.
- Bigame, comedy in three acts, éditions Librairie théâtrale, 1886.
- La Courtisane de Corinthe.
- Ma Bru !, performed at the Théâtre de l'Odéon in 1898.
- Le Gant, comedy in one act, éditions P.-V. Stock, 1905.
- L’Âme des héros, one-act play in verses, created at the Comédie-Française, 6 June 1907.
- L'École des bavards ou Parler, scene in three periods, éditions Georges Ondet, 1919.
- La Douche, comedy de salon, played by Coquelin cadet and Melle Scellier, éditions Librairie Théâtrale, 1884.
- Gustave !, comedy de salon in one act
- Heureuse !, comedy in three acts
- La Famille Boléro, play in three acts
- Les Espérances, comedy in one act, in prose, Paris, Théâtre du Vaudeville, 2 September 1885
- J’attends Ernest, comedy in one act, in prose, Paris, Théâtre du Palais-Royal, 11 April 1885
- Le Papillon, comedy in one act, in verses
Librettos
La Soubrette, operetta in one act, with Quénéhen and Rambaud Un mariage à bout portant, operetta in one act, with Remy, music by Cieutat Toto, operetta in three acts, with Albert Barré, music by Antoine Banès Madame Rose, opera-comique in one act, with Albert Barré, music by Antoine Banès Nos bons chasseurs, vaudeville in three acts, with Michel Carré fils, music by Charles Lecocq Le Roi Frelon, operetta in three acts, with Albert Barré, music by d'Antoine Banès La Tourte, operetta in one act, music by Gaston Serpette La Jarretière, operetta in one act, with Albert Barré, music by Antoine Banès La Fiancée du trombone à coulisse, fairly joyous symphonologue, music by Émile PessardPaintings
- 1882 : "Combat de nègres pendant la nuit "