Monday 5 December 2011

Félix Vallotton - part 4 - woodcuts (1)



This is part 4 of a 5-part post on the works of Swiss-born artist Félix Vallotton (1865 – 1925), a painter and printmaker associated with Les Nabis.

For a single decade at the end of the 19th-century Félix Vallotton enjoyed fame above all else as a print maker. Vallotton’s boldly reductive approach to the woodcut is credited by many art historians of his time (and ours) as having modernized and revitalised the form in Western art.

Like many European artists of the late 19th Century, Vallotton was deeply enamoured with the reduced palette and suggestive forms of Japanese woodcuts. His artfully naive compositions from the period demonstrate the extent to which popular Ukiyo-e prints exerted an influence on his painting. In 1891, Vallotton began to experiment with the medium directly, producing an interpretive woodcut of Paul Verlaine that represented a clear break with the established practices of European printmaking.


1891 A Paul Verlain

The work was a critical success, and Vallotton went on to produce idealized portraits of other major figures in the arts and letters, all but abandoning the tonal cross hatching techniques other print makers in the West had used to create modulated areas of light and shadow.

Vallotton’s mature style embraced stark contrasts and dramatic tension. He used the woodcut to explore various facets of fin de siècle Paris, from political intrigue and urban street life to shifting gender roles. Julius Meier-Graefe, the eminent German art critic who helped to establish Pan, took an interest in the work. In 1898 he published Felix Vallotton, Biographie, a dual translation French/German monograph on the artist that included a broad selection of the woodcuts and a compelling endorsement of his innovative style.







The monograph features imagery drawn from The Demonstration, Vallotton’s celebrated series from 1893-1895, which recorded the social unrest and anarchistic violence of the era, depicting assassins and anarchists, executions and suicides. Biographie also showcases the tender side of his work, including sensual female nudes, family scenes, and private moments between men and women.
Vallotton married Gabrielle Rodrigues-Henriques in 1899 and his attention largely returned to painting, with a focus on domestic scenes and landscapes. He enjoyed continued popular success as an artist, becoming a mainstay of the Paris Salons and other major European venues, and later, serving as a commissioned artist for the French army during the First World War.

Vallotton died of complications from cancer just one day after his 60th birthday, on December 29th, 1925. But the graphic influence of his woodcuts endures, with artists including Aubrey Beardsley, Frans Masereel, Lynd Ward and Raymond Pettibon showing hints of his characteristic style in their works.


1894 Le Bain (The Bath)

1896 La Paresse (Laziness)

1896 Paul Adam

1898 Cinq Heures (Five o' Clock)

1898 L'Argent (Money)

1898 L'Argent (Money)

1898 Le Mensonge (The Lie)

1900 Léon Blum

A Edgar Poe

A Ibsen

Emile Zola

L'Alerte (The Alarm)

L'Anarchiste (The Anarchist)

L'Assassinat (The Assassin)

L'Eclat (The Scandal)

L'Execution (The Execution)

La Charge (The Charge)

Sunday 4 December 2011

Félix Vallotton - part 3

1914 Self-Portrait 
oil on canvas

This is part 3 of a five-part post on the works of Swiss-born artist Félix Vallotton (1865 – 1925), a painter and printmaker associated with Les Nabis. For biographical notes on Vallotton see part 1. Parts 4-5 will feature Vallotton's excellent woodcuts.


1915 Les Javelles

1917 Ruins at Souain

1917 Ruins at Souain, Sunset

1917 Senegalese Soldiers at the camp of Mailly 
oil on canvas

1917 Verdun

1918 Paysage composé sous-bois

1920 Alyscamps morning sun

1921 View of Cagne from Horseback

1922 Chrysanthemums and Autumn Foliage

1922 Part of the Town of Pont-Audemer

1922 The Family of Trees

1923 A Vallon Landscape

1923 Evening on the Loire

1924 Chateau Gaillard at Andelys

1924 Marigolds and Tangerines 
oil on canvas

1925 Rocamadour Landscape

A Street

Thursday 1 December 2011

Félix Vallotton - part 2

1891 Self-portrait 
oil on canvas

This is part 2 of a five-part post on the works of Swiss-born artist Félix Vallotton (1865 – 1925), a painter and printmaker associated with Les Nabis. For biographical notes on Vallotton see part 1.


1900 Autumn Crocuses

1900 Cloud in Romanel 
oil on cardboard

1900 Dinner by Lamplight

1900 Nude at the Stove

1900 The Laundress, Blue Room 
oil on paper

1900 Woman Reading to a Little Girl

1901 The Pont Neuf

1901 The Port of Marseille

1902 Gossip

1904 Interior with Woman in Pink

1904 Interior, Vestibule by Lamplight

1904 Lady at the Piano

1907 Three Women and a Little Girl Playing in the Water

1908 Woman with Black Hat

1909 At the Café

1909 Box Seats at the Theatre

1909 Villa Beaulieu, Honfleur

1910 Sunset, Orange Sky 
oil on canvas

1911 Seated Black Woman

1913 The Rising Tide