Eugène Carrière

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"Self-portrait" , oil on canvas, 41 × 33 cm , Musée d'Orsay
" Femme accoudée à la table ", 1893, oil on canvas

Eugène Carrière (born January 18, 1849 in Gournay-sur-Marne , † March 27, 1906 in Paris ) was a French painter and lithographer . The symbolist is known for his portraits of artists and poets of his time as well as for gloomy, shadowy paintings of women and children.

Life

Eugène Carrière was born the eighth of nine children into a very poor family and grew up in Strasbourg . There he completed a five-year apprenticeship as a lithographer . Against his father's wishes, stimulated by the pictures by Rubens in the Louvre , which he admired, he decided in 1869 to study at the Paris Art School with Alexandre Cabanel . A year later he volunteered for the French army and was taken prisoner in Dresden .

In 1872 he returned to Paris. During a short stay in London, he got to know the paintings of William Turner , which had a strong influence on him. During this time he married Sophie Desmouceaux, with whom he later had seven children.

In the following years he lived as a commercial artist without much success from casual work to support his growing family. Among other things, he designed greeting cards and worked in the porcelain factory in Sèvres, where a friendship developed with Auguste Rodin , who also worked there .

Success began for Carrière only in 1889, when, at the age of 40, he won an art prize in the Paris Salon and had his own exhibitions. At this time he, who previously painted rather colorful pictures, had found the typical style for which he is known today. In the following years Carrière was one of the most famous French painters of his time. He painted many portraits of celebrities of his time; his friends included Rodin, Paul Gauguin and Edmond de Goncourt .

As one of the greats of the Parisian artistic world of the fin de siècle , Eugène Carrière was not apolitical and interested in current affairs. He was one of a number of public figures that in the Dreyfus affair , the J'accuse of Émile Zola supported.

In 1899 he founded the Académie Carrière , where Henri Matisse and André Derain were among his students.

Eugène Carrière, who had been suffering from throat cancer for a long time, died on March 27, 1906 in his studio in the Villa des Arts on Montmartre. At his funeral, at which his friend Auguste Rodin gave the funeral oration, a large part of the Parisian artist community was gathered.

plant

" Motherhood (approx. 1890) " Oil on canvas, 49 × 64.5 cm , Museum of Fine Arts Budapest

Carrière preferred two main subjects. The representation of mothers with their children ( maternity ) and portraits. As an unknown painter, he could not afford models at a young age. This contributed to the fact that many of his pictures show members of his family.

Eugène Carrière is known for the style that he adopted in the late 1880s. This consists of monochrome, gray-brown pictures in which the facial features of people emerge from a foggy, dark environment. In this way his pictures create situations of great intimacy.

Carrière's best-known work is a portrait of the French poet Paul Verlaine , but he also painted portraits of Georges Clemenceau , Isadora Duncan and many other famous contemporary artists.

effect

"Portrait Paul Verlaines " , oil on canvas, 61 × 51 cm, Musée d'Orsay

It is often suggested that Pablo Picasso was influenced by Carrière in his blue period . Although Picasso dedicated a painting to him, this cannot be clearly proven.

Well known and loved during his lifetime, Carrière was somewhat forgotten in the decades after his death. Even if many well-known museums in Europe exhibit his works, he stands in the shadow of well-known contemporaries. In 2006, on the centenary of his death, there were increased efforts to bring Carrière's work back into the public eye, including through an exhibition at the Musée d'Orsay , which has the world's largest collection of Carrière's paintings.

Museums (selection)

Web links

Commons : Eugène Carrière  - collection of images, videos and audio files