Cornelius van Dongen was one of the original fauves (wild beasts) of modern art. Today he is one of the tamest pets of Paris. At 75, he is a dapper and well-to-do gentleman who sports a Shavian beard and has a well-appointed studio on the fashionable Rue de Courcelles. Over the past 30 years he has become the most successful portrait painter in France. His models: just about everyone from Maurice Chevalier to Queen Marie of Rumania.
The son of a Rotterdam brewery worker, Van Dongen hardly expected to become a pet of the upper classes: art was more serious than that....
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