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William-Adolphe Bouguereau (November 30, 1825 – August 19, 1905) was a French academic painter. Bouguereau was a staunch traditionalist whose realistic genre paintings and mythological themes were modern interpretations of Classical subjects with a heavy emphasis on the female human body. Although he created an idealized world, his almost photo-realistic style was popular with rich art patrons. He was very famous in his time but today his subject matter and technique receive relatively little attention compared to the popularity of the Impressionists.
[edit] Life and career
William-Adolphe Bouguereau was born in La Rochelle, France on November 30, 1825, into a family of wine and olive oil merchants. He seemed destined to join the family business but for the intervention of his uncle Eugène, a curate, who taught him classical and biblical subjects, and arranged for Bouguereau to go to high school. Bouguereau showed artistic talent early on and his father was convinced by a client to send him to the École des Beaux-Arts in Bordeaux, where he won first prize in figure painting for a depiction of Saint Roch. To earn extra money, he designed labels for jams and preserves.[1]
Through his uncle, Bouguereau was given a commission to paint portraits of parishioners, and when his aunt matched the sum he earned, Bouguereau went to Paris and became a student at the École des Beaux-Arts.[2] To supplement his formal training in drawing, he attended anatomical dissections and studied historical costumes and archeology. He was admitted to the studio of François-Edouard Picot, where he studied painting in the academic style. Academic painting placed the highest status on historical and mythological subjects and Bouguereau won the coveted Prix de Rome in 1850, with his Zenobia Found by Shepherds on the Banks of the Araxes.[3] His reward was a stay at the Villa Medici in Rome, Italy, where in addition to formal lessons he was able to study first-hand the Renaissance artists and their masterpieces.
Bouguereau, completely in tune with the traditional Academic style, exhibited at the annual exhibitions of the Paris Salon for his entire working life.
An early reviewer stated, “M. Bouguereau has a natural instinct and knowledge of contour. The eurythmie of the human body preoccupies him, and in recalling the happy results which, in this genre, the ancients and the artists of the sixteenth century arrived at, one can only congratulate M. Bouguereau in attempting to follow in their footsteps…Raphael was inspired by the ancients…and no one accused him of not being original.”[4]
Raphael was a favorite of Bouguereau and he took this review as a high compliment. He had fulfilled one of the requirements of the Prix de Rome by completing a old-master copy of Raphael’s The Triumph of Galatea. In many of his works, he followed the same classical approach to composition, form, and subject matter.[5]
In 1856, he married Marie-Nelly Monchablon and subsequently had five children. By the late 1850s, he made strong connections with art dealers, particularly Paul Durand-Ruel (later the champion of the Impressionists), who helped clients buy paintings from artists who exhibited at the Salons.[6] The Salons annually drew over 300,000 people, thereby providing valuable exposure to exhibited artists.[7] Bouguereau’s fame extended to England by the 1860s and then he bought a large house and studio in Montparnasse with his growing income.[8]
Bouguereau was a staunch traditionalist whose realistic genre paintings and mythological themes were modern interpretations of Classical subjects—both pagan and Christian—with a heavy concentration on the female human body. Although he created an idealized world, his almost photo-realistic style brought to life his goddesses, nymphs, bathers, shepherdesses, and madonnas in a way which was very appealing to rich art patrons of his time. Some critics, however, preferred the honesty of Jean-François Millet’s truer-to-life depiction of hard-working farmers and laborers.
Bouguereau employed traditional methods of working up a painting, including detailed pencil studies and oil sketches, and his careful method resulted in a pleasing and accurate rendering of the human form. His painting of skin, hands, and feet was particularly admired.[9] He also used some of the religious and erotic symbolism of the Old Masters, such as the “broken pitcher” which connoted lost innocence.[10]
One of the rewards of staying within the Academic style and doing well in the Salons was receiving commissions to decorate private houses, public buildings, and churches. As was typical of these commissions, sometimes Bouguereau would paint in his own style, and other times he had to conform to an existing group style. Early on, Bouguereau was commissioned in all three venues, which added enormously to his prestige and fame. He also made reductions of his public paintings for sale to patrons, of which The Annunciation (1888) is an example.[11] He was also a successful portrait painter though many of his paintings of wealthy patrons still remain in private hands.[12]
Bouguereau steadily gained the honors of the Academy, reaching Life Member in 1876, and Commander of the Legion of Honor and Grand Medal of Honor in 1885.[13] He began to teach drawing at the Académie Julian in 1875, a co-ed art institution independent of the École des Beaux-Arts, with no entrance exams and with nominal fees.[14]
In 1877, both his wife and infant son died. At a rather advanced age, Bouguereau was married for the second time in 1896, to fellow artist Elizabeth Jane Gardner Bouguereau, one of his pupils.[15] He also used his influence to open many French art institutions to women for the first time, including the Académie française.
Near the end of his life he described his love of his art, “Each day I go to my studio full of joy; in the evening when obliged to stop because of darkness I can scarcely wait for the next morning to come…if I cannot give myself to my dear painting I am miserable”.[16] He painted eight hundred and twenty-six paintings.
Bouguereau died in La Rochelle at age 80 from heart disease.
[edit] Fame and fall
Tête d'Etude l'Oiseau (1867), Rehs Galleries, Inc., New York City
In his own time, Bouguereau was considered to be one of the greatest painters in the world by the Academic art community, and simultaneously he was reviled by the avant-garde. He also gained wide fame in Belgium, Holland, Spain, and in the United States, and commanded high prices.[12]
Bouguereau’s career was a nearly straight up ascent with hardly a setback.[17] To many, he epitomized taste and refinement, and a respect for tradition. To others, he was a competent technician stuck in the past. Degas and his associates used the term “Bouguereauté” in a derogatory manner to describe any artistic style reliant on “slick and artificial surfaces”,[17] also known as a licked finish. In 1900, Degas and Monet reportedly named him as most likely to be remembered as the greatest 19th-century French painter by the year 2000, according to chairman Fred Ross of the Art Renewal Center — although with Degas' famous trenchant wit, and the aesthetic tendencies of the two Impressionists, it is possible the statement was meant as an ironic comment on the taste of the future public.
Bouguereau’s works were eagerly bought by American millionaires who considered him the most important French artist of that time.[12] But after 1920, Bouguereau fell into disrepute, due in part to changing tastes and partly to his staunch opposition to the Impressionists who were finally gaining acceptance. For decades following, his name was not even mentioned in encyclopedias.
[edit] His name
W.Bouguereau signature (detail).
Sources on his full name are contradictory: some give William-Adolphe Bouguereau (composed name), William Adolphe Bouguereau (usual and civil-only names according to the French tradition), while others give Adolphe William Bouguereau (with Adolphe as the usual name). However, the artist used to sign his works simply as William Bouguereau (hinting "William" was his given name, whatever the order), or more precisely as "W.Bouguereau.date" (French alphabet) and later as "W-BOVGVEREAV-date" (Latin alphabet).
[edit] Legacy
In 1974, the New York Cultural Center staged a show of Bouguereau's work as a curiosity. In 1984, the Borghi Gallery hosted the commercial show of his 23 oil paintings and 1 drawing. In the same year a major exhibition was organized by the Montréal Museum of Fine Arts, in Canada. The exhibition opened at the Musée du Petit-Palais, in Paris, traveled to The Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, and concluded in Montréal. This was the beginning of renewal of interest about Bouguereau. In 1997 Mark Borghi and Laura Borghi organized an early Internet exhibition.
In 2000, the Art Renewal Center was founded by Fred Ross and like-minded artists and collectors to oppose Modernism and advocate earlier values of art. They particularly champion the work of Bouguereau, who Ross considers is "deserving of the highest accolades in the art world."[18][19]
Today, over one hundred museums throughout the world exhibit Bouguereau's works.
[edit] Selected works
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, Bouguereau, Pomegranate Artbooks, Rohnert Park, CA, 1996, ISBN 0-87654-582-7, p. 11
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 11
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 12
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 24
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 25
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 13
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 70
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 14
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 112
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 60
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 31
- ^ a b c Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 103
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 16
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 110
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 15
- ^ Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 114
- ^ a b Fronia E. Wissman, 1996, p. 9
- ^ Edwards, Alun. "ARC : art renewal center", Intute: Arts and Humanities, 17 October 2007. Retrieved 23 July 2008.
- ^ Roth, Mark. "Gifted artist? Bouguereau's work controversial more than a century after his death", Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 21 August 2007. Retrieved 8 September 2007.
[edit] References
- Albert Boime: The Academy and French Painting in the Nineteenth Century (London, 1971).
- Aleska Celebonovic: Peinture kitsch ou réalisme bourgeois, l'art pompier dans le monde. Paris: Seghers, 1974.
- Art Pompier: Anti-Impressionism. New York: The Emily Lowe Gallery, Hofstra University, 1974.
- Mario Amaya (Forward), Robert Isaacson (catalogue and selection): William Adolphe Bouguereau. New York: New York Cultural Center, 1974.
- John Russell: Art: Cultural Center Honors Bouguereau. In New York Times, 1974.
- Louise d 'Argencourt and Douglas Druick: The Other Nineteenth Century. Ottawa: The National Gallery of Canada, 1978.
- James Harding: Les peintres pompiers. Paris: Flammarion, 1980.
- "The Bouguereau Market". The Art newsletter. January 6, 1981. pp. 6-8.
- Louise d'Argencourt and Mark Steven Walker: William Bouguereau. Montreal, Canada: The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, 1984.
- Robert Rosenblum and H.W. Janson: 19th Century Art. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1984.
- Michael Gibson: Bouguereau's "Photo-Idealism". In International Herald Tribune, 1984.
- Grace Glueck: To Bouguereau, Art Was Strictly "The Beautiful. In The New York Times, 1985.
- Cécile Ritzenthaler: L'école des beaux art du XIXe siècle. édition Mayer, 1987
- Exhibition catalogue William Adolphe Bouguereau, L'Art Pompier. Borghi & Co., New York, 1991.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
[edit] Gallery
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Dante And Virgil In Hell (1850)
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A Portrait of Amelina Dufaud Bouguereau (1850)
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A Portrait of Eugène Bouguereau (1850)
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A Portrait of Geneviève Bouguereau (1850)
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A Portrait of Léonie Bouguereau (1850)
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Portrait of Monsieur M. (1850)
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Arion on a Sea Horse (1855)
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Bacchante on a Panther (1855)
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The Day of the Dead (1859)
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Tobias Saying Good-Bye to his Father (1860)
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Young Woman Contemplating Two Embracing Children (1861)
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The Remorse of Orestes (1862)
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Premières Caresses (1866)
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Gypsy Girl with a Basque Drum (1867)
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The Bunch Of Grapes (1868)
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Maternal Admiration (1869)
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Washerwomen of Fouesnant (1869)
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Breton Brother and Sister (1871)
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Italian Girl Drawing Water (1871)
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Young Mother Gazing At Her Child (1871)
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Child Braiding A Crown (1874)
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Homer and his Guide (1874)
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At the Edge of the Brook (1875)
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The Virgin, Jesus & Saint John Baptist (1875)
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Return from the Harvest (1878)
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At the Edge of the Brook (1879)
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Mademoiselle Elizabeth Gardner (1879)
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The Flagellation of Our Lord Jesus Christ (1880)
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A Young Girl Defending Herself Against Eros (1880)
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Song of the Angels (1881)
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The Little Knitter (1882)
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The Difficult Lesson (1884)
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The Horseback Ride (1884)
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The Youth of Bacchus (1884)
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Young Girl Going to the Spring (1885)
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The Young Shepherdess (1885)
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Self-Portrait Presented To M. Sage (1886)
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Brother And Sister (1887)
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Young Shepherdess Standing (1887)
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Study: Head Of A Little Girl (1888)
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The Little Shepherdess (1889)
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Whisperings of Love (1889)
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Young Girl Crocheting (1889)
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Love on the Look Out (1890)
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Portrait of Gabrielle Cot (1890)
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The Broken Pitcher (1891)
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The Abduction of Psyche (1895) |
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Not Too Much To Carry (1895)
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The Song of the Nightingale (1895)
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Head Of A Young Girl (1898)
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Girl Holding Lemons (1899)
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The Virgin With Angels (1900)
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The Madonna of the Roses (1903)
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