About Paul Maze
When you've got a huge character who chooses painting as an expression of life, there is never a dull moment. A painter is born, not made, and it is such a powerful force that often their lives become miserable and even dishonest without painting.
Paul did everything with brave and passionate honesty. He was driven by a deep respect for nature and the human beauty of body and soul. Music and sculpture moved him to tears and his collection of literature in several languages was always at hand near a place to sit and delve into the books. He had a remarkable natural charisma and openness, which helped him make friends out of strangers and which opened doors everywhere he traveled to.
He was fascinated by people’s lives. Each individual's world became an inspiration and often a subject for a painting. Pastel instilled itself as a medium with which he could work fast with his wonderful vibrant use of colour and movement. His legacy hangs in so many private homes, military establishments and racing clubs for both sailing and horse racing. In New York and Palm Beach his pastels are in private collections and public buildings such as hospitals and clubs. His pictures convey a sense of the joy of life, which he had so fully lived.
Not many know of his life before he settled in Sussex, England. He was a Frenchman, born in Le Havre on the North Coast of France in 1887. Coming from a musical family, it soon became apparent that Paul had no gift for music. So instead his father decided to give him his own little wooden paintbox and took him to visit his painter friends. When they were watching Pisarro at work one day, his father said to him: ‘Now look at this scene and remember not only how he is painting, but also with how much love’, which is something that Paul has never forgotten as evident in his work throughout the years.
He spent his youth at Le Havre haven or the beach, where he would observe the old painters at work. When he came of age his father expected him to take over the family business. But after traveling the world in an attempt to learn it, he instead learned that there was no escaping the fact that he was an artist, not a businessman. After his many travels and adventures (some quite extraordinary ones during the war, first as an interpreter and then as an artist, his eye seeing aspects of the landscape which would otherwise have gone unnoticed to his superiors), he installed himself in Paris, the then Mecca of the Arts, where he was quickly surrounded with a group of artistic friends (Segonzac, Derain, Marchand, Roussel, Boussingault, Levy, Salomon and Villeboeuf among others). It resulted what he later called the most fascinating and fulfilling period of his life.
But his close friend Captain Thomas Nelson, who had died in action during the war, had made him promise to visit his wife in the event of his death. My grandmother Margaret was an exceptional person whom I had the privilege of knowing. They lived in Scotland for a while before moving to London as Paul found the countryside too quiet and uneventful to work there. He fell in love with the excitement and bustle of London, but they often traveled to France where he had kept a studio. Living with a capricious artist was quite exhausting for Margaret, which is why they were able to remain friends after he eloped. His second wife Jessie, with her long red hair and feminine beauty, became a muse for hundreds of touching paintings.
Maze continued to work in both France and England, until the Second World War had started and he once again worked as an adjuntant and artist. After the war, he and Jessie settled in Treyford and he lived there until his death in 1979.