Léon Pourtau is born in Bordeaux on November 23rd 1868 from Clément-Jean-Baptiste Pourtau, shoemaker, and Valérie Lescure, unemployed. The family lives at 35 Boyer Street in a little house typical of the region. Surrounded by caring and devoted parents, the child grew up in an environment conducive to the emergence of a precocious talent. Dynamic city, there is plenty of work to do for his father in Bordeaux thus allowing him to provide a certain comfort to Léon and to introduce him at an early age to the arts. Indeed, the recently expanded Bordeaux Museum of Fine Arts which hosts an important collection of Dutch painting is located just a few hundred meters away of the family house.

In 1881, Léon Pourtau is an apprentice typesetter in Bordeaux. Calm, cheerful, and conscientious in his work, it is apparent early that he has evident manual abilities. Working with small lead types and placing them in the appropriate place, is a game that is in line with his mathematical spirit. However, inclined to art, Léon rapidly gets bored of this life given rhythm by printing press and type case. Aged 14, he tries his hand at drawing and learns the lessons from the Dutch masters he often visits in his hometown museum.

In 1884, aged 15, with his parent’s agreement, he leaves his house, and takes the train for the capital of arts; Paris. On November 18th 1884, he is admitted as a student in the clarinet class at Paris's Conservatory of Music and Declamation. Due to financial difficulties Léon takes a job in parallel of his studies; this led him to miss his first year exams in June 1885. However, his clarinet abilities enable him to make replacements in orchestras and café-concerts such as the Delta café and to take part in a cirque tour – where his musical skills were appreciated as much as his manual dexterity to install and uninstall the circus tent on the occasion of every representation –. On November 12th 1886, Léon Pourtau reintegrates the clarinet class of Mr. Rose on the jury's decision. At the Conservatory of Music he befriends Louis Abbiate (1866-1933). The latter received the First Prize for double bass and harmony in 1886, and is friend with the painter Louis Hayet (1864-1940) who will portray him (Cellist at practice, 1889). At this time, musicians often met at parties organized by a famous pianist named Gabriel Fabre (1858-1921). Maximilien Luce (1858-1941) and Paul Signac (1863-1935) often join enriching the debate with their artistic comments. Signac and Hayet, along with Léon Pourtau, were sometimes invited to decorate the musical scores. In 1887, he wins the First clarinet Price for playing a concertino by Weber at the National conservatory of music and declamation. He is directly recruited to join the Colonne orchestra.

Alongside Lucien Pissarro (1863-1944) and Louis Hayet, he takes evening classes in a public drawing and sculpting school of Paris located at 15 Bréguet Street and directed by Mr.Vion, former student of Léon Cogniet (1794-1880). The education was purely academic; therefore, the three friends seek modernity on the Grands Boulevard's cafe-theaters where they portray the life of Parisian night owls. At that time, Léon Pourtau meets Georges Seurat who recently invented the technique of simultaneous contrast. He often goes in the master's studio to watch him while smoking the pipe.

On April 1st 1889, Léon Pourtau is incorporated into the 103rd infantry of Paris; as of April 29th he serves as musician. He is discharged on April 1st 1890 with a certificate of good conduct.

During the summer of 1890, he is in Aix-les-Bains, a commune in the department of Savoie, where he went off on a series of concerts with Achille Vallad (known as William) a musician friend. There, he meets his friend's sister, Marie-Eulalie. It was love at first sight for both them. The wedding is celebrated in the 15th arrondissement of Paris on October 23rd 1890. Léon's four best men are Parisian friends: Victor Barrucand, poet, aged 25, Jules Verné, 35 years old musician, Charles Hayet, musician, aged 24, and Louis Hayet, 26 years old painter.

Léo Pourtau, 18 years-old In the front plan: on the right Léon Pourtau and his dog Roco, on his right Mrs Vallad, at her feet unknown child. In the background: on the right Marie-Eulalie Pourtau, on her right François Dorias.

City of Lyon (France). Salon’s official brochure, 1895 Extract from the Journal de Guignol where a review of a work by Pourtau was published, 1895 Article in the newspaper Boston Evening, 15 December 1898 in memory of Léon Pourtau Article in the newspaper Boston Evening, 15 December 1898 in memory of Léon Pourtau Catalogue of the posthumous exhibition of Léon Pourtau, 7-16 December 1898, St. Botolph Club

On May 8th 1891, Berthe Pourtau is born from Léon Pourtau, musician, aged 22, and Marie-Eulalie Vallad, 18 years old, commercial employee who gave birth at home at 13 Ravignan Street in the 18th arrondissement. Caring father, Léon spends a lot of time in his house on Ravignan Street taking care of Berthe and practicing painting in his improvised studio. When commuting to the Châtelet Theater, for orchestra rehearsals, the few kilometers that separate it from his house resulted in delays that his chief once seriously reprimanded. He resigns and accepts Alexandre Luigini's (1850-1906) - conductor at Lyon's Opera Theater - proposition to become solo clarinet. The family arrives in Lyon in September 1891 and settles in the Croix-Rousse neighborhood at 8 Impasse Dubois. At Lyon's Opera, Léon Porteau encounters Clovis Terraire (1858-1931) and Théodore Lespinasse (1846-1918), who share the same professional obligations and love for painting. If he didn't paint much in Paris – mainly focusing on drawing – Léon Pourtau fully expresses his talent in Lyon and its surroundings, where he seeks the vibrant light of the Saône banks. It is also at this period that he becomes friend with François Dorias (1855-1936) a postman who practices amateur painting.

If music has a soothing properties for many, for Léon Pourtau is has always been a way to earn money. When having a conversation with his relatives he sometimes says: "God, music is boring. Once you know how to play the music core you know you won't ever do it better, there is nothing left to look for." From that moment on, Léon devoted himself to painting; striding the surroundings of Lyon with Marie-Eulalie and his friends during his spare time. The various and wild landscapes of the area enable the artists to liberate their senses. However, Léon's art is different from that of his friends, Terraire and Lespinasse, who remain more conventional in their representation. Inspired by Adolphe Monticelli's (1824-1886) technique, Dorias produces original and personal artworks. Léon adopted this technique for some of his commands, using a thick impasto that holds the light and convey a melancholic atmosphere. Soon, Léon will go back to the technique of simultaneous contrast that conveys an effect of intense color and light vibration. The artists attached to the school of Lyon remains untouched by the new technique that Seurat imposed to the art world. With his style, Léon Pourtau, is going to surprise his colleagues. If the way they convey their sensations onto the canvas is different, these artists depict the same landscapes, the same Saône riverbanks, the Bugey region. Terraire inviting Pourtau to settle his easel in the surroundings of Marseille and Pourtau proposing to Terraire to paint the Bourget Lake, near Aix-les-Bains in Savoie.

Léon Pourtau is going to participate to the Salons, organized by the Lyon Society of Fine Arts in 1894. He proposed two artworks - Autumn Impression, number 583, and Air and Light Impressions, number 584-. In 1895, he presented the Portrait of Mrs. Laure B, under the number 517. In the local newspaper we could read: "Personal technique, looks like pastel, quite harmonious."

Léon and Marie-Eulalie moved to settle in Saint-Foy-Lès-Lyon, located a few kilometers away from the city of Lyon, at 2 bis chemin de Fontalière. On July 3rd 1894, the musician was appointed by the Mayor, at the Conservatory's board. However, he accepts Muller's proposal – an impresario seeking for talents – to become clarinet solo for the Boston Symphony Orchestra in the United States. The contract guarantees a very comfortable living; 60 000 francs for three years and a renewable contract. At the end of August 1894, Pourtau took his leave with Opera. On September 15th, the musician leaves Lyon for the Havre and embarks, on the 22nd, on the liner La Champagne for New York. In the middle of October, once confirmed in his new position, Léon Pourtau's wife and stepmother, Madame Vallad, join him. They settle in a modern house in Roxbury - Boston's suburbs- at 5 Atherton Place. Leon easily adapts to the orchestra, his sympathy and musical qualities enable him to befriend Charles Martin Loeffler (1861-1935), assistant conductor.

During the spring of 1895, Loeffler invites the Pourtau couple in his property in Medfield Village located about forty kilometers from Boston. There, a little group of artists settled. Léon immediately falls in love with this charming village and the couple ends up going there every weekend. In a letter sent to his friend Dorias on July 4th 1895, Léon expresses his enthusiasm: "A charming place, perfect for a painter, a river like the Saône [...] wood, plains, fields, marvelous horizons...” he goes on "the small river which I talked to you about (Charles River) is full of similar motifs, you just have to look and paint." The letter was paired up with a little sketch.

In a letter written to his brother in law on December 3rd 1895, Léon is delighted to have sold one of his paintings to a "rich banker." In correspondence to Dorias on June 10th 1897, Léon Pourtau talks about an article that had been published in the Boston Press in 1896. "Musician and painter. Bostonian who go to the Symphony Concerto are most probably acquainted to Léon Pourtau's figure and know which musician he is. But they probably ignore that this young French paints very well. In France, he was a friend and student of the posh and distinguished impressionist Pissarro, whose artworks are known by all those visiting galleries and exhibitions in his country. Nature lover, Mr. Pourtau has a quiet summerhouse in the pretty city of Medflied, where, 25 years ago, Georges Innes – America's most renowned landscape painter – had a house and studio. Last summer, Mr. Pourtau dedicated all his time to painting; the result can be seen in a group of paintings in the Williams and Everett galleries. In its paintings, anyone can recognize the inspiration and theories on which the artist’s interpretation of nature relied. It is evident that he chooses his colors and composes his palette as anyone following the Impressionist school. He uses the same pure tones and employs the same theories on sun and shadows. The result of his work is far more satisfying than that of other landscape painters following the same technique. Inevitably, the artist starts to see and think by himself. His paintings convey a local flavor and his landscapes are evidently New England styled. One of the most interesting the group represents is probably a brilliant summer day showing a freshly cut grass, sun-kissed haystacks, a blue sky full of light, and the shadow of clouds falling on the foreground. Full of encouragements and promises, this painting is a simple piece of nature interpreted in a tender and pleasant way. Next to this painting is hanged a radically different one. Set in the shade, the landscape painting releases a clear and cold atmosphere [sic]; huge clouds darken the sky and indicate a storm is coming. Another painting shows an impression of a tender sunset. The sky is delicately toned, and thin clouds made of purple and golden edges hung low. The shadow falls down. These paintings will stay a week and are worthy of all those who are interested by art.”

In August 1896 in a letter sent to William, Léon writes: “how happy I am to paint all day long!”

After having spent four years in the United States the Pourtau family decides to go on a trip to France. On July 2nd 1898, one of the General Transatlantic Company liners – La Bourgogne- leaves New York. On board, 200 crewmembers and 500 passengers, amongst which, the Pourtau couple and Mrs. Vallad. On July 4th 1898, around 5 in the morning, the liner passes about 60 miles south of Sable Island – not far away from the Canadian coast – when a brutal choc awakes the passengers. The Bourgogne just collided with a sailing ship heading towards Philadelphia. A dense fog reduced visibility and made it impossible for the liner to see and avoid the Cromartyshire who was coming. More than 500 persons sank amongst which Marie-Eulalie, Léon and Mrs. Vallad.

Two press articles released in the Boston Evening on December 8th, and December 15th, 1898, relate the painter’s posthumous exhibition. Léon Pourtau’s American friend organized at the St Botolph Club Gallery, 2 Newsbury Street, a moving retrospective where the artists artworks generates considerable enthusiasm.

This article confirms that during his American period, Léon Pourtau intensely dedicated himself to drawing and painting (55 works of art) which found buyer during his posthumous exhibition.