Théodore Roussel

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Théodore Roussel, self-portrait, 1901, drypoint

Théodore Casimir Roussel (born March 23, 1847 in Lorient , Brittany , France , † April 23, 1926 in Hastings (St. Leonards-on-Sea), East Sussex , England ) was a Franco-British painter and printmaker . He was known for his watercolors, pastels, oil paintings and etchings, in which he carried out his portraits, landscape paintings and genre motifs .

life and work

Théodore Roussel (in Great Britain Theodore Roussel) came to painting only in 1872, after he had finished his military service after the Franco-Prussian War . He was a self-taught painter and trained himself through self-study. He painted early works that showed scenes from everyday, modern life in the style of the old masters. He moved to London in 1878 , married the Englishwoman Frances Amelia Smithson Bull in 1880 and met the famous painter James McNeill Whistler in 1885 , with whom he subsequently had a lifelong personal and artistic friendship.

Theodore Roussel, The Reading Girl ( Reading Girl ), 1886/1887. Oil on canvas, 152.4 × 161.3 cm. Donated by Mrs. Walter Herriot in memory of the artist, 1927, Tate Gallery, London

1887 took Roussel with a sensational picture at an exhibition of secessionist founded in 1885 New English Art Club in part: In The Reading Girl ( Reading Girl ) (1886/1887, oil on canvas, 152.4 x 161.3 cm) showed the Life-size artist a girl placed on a folding chair against a dark background, reading a newspaper. “It is the reading of an intellectual, modern woman who is not sexually available in spite of her nudity.” The painting, which spoke against the conservative, academic view of the image, was hostile to the public. The London weekly newspaper The Spectator wrote: "[...] This is realism of the worst kind: the artist's eye only sees the vulgar exterior of his model and depicts it dull and raw." However, it immediately made the artist well known and was, according to the painter Sir William Orpen , the best nude painting of its time.

For the painting Reading Girl , Roussel sat the young Harriet (Hetty) Pettigrew (1867–1953) as a model. She and her sisters Rose and Lily were sought-after and well-paid models of painters James McNeill Whistler , William Holman Hunt , John Everett Millais, and others. Hetty became the lover of the married Roussel, and the relationship resulted in a child. After his wife's death, he did not legalize the connection with Hetty Pettigrew, but married Arthur Melville's widow Ethel.

But Roussel was by no means only interested in spectacular subjects. In the late 1880s he moved to Chelsea , London , where he bought Belfield House on Parson's Green. A new artists' quarter had emerged in Chelsea, and from its proximity to the Thames he now obtained many of his motifs ( Blue Thames, End of a Summer Afternoon, Chelsea , 1888, oil on canvas, 84 × 121 cm). From 1888 he learned the technique of etching and drypoint etching from Whistler and thus discovered a medium which he continued to perfect through many experiments. Roussel is considered one of the pioneers of color etching in Great Britain. He participated frequently in the exhibitions of the Royal Society of British Artists (chaired only by Whistler), the New English Art Club and the Royal Scottish Academy . In 1908 he became a founding member of the British artists 'association Allied Artists' Association (AAA).

Occasionally, works by the artist can be found in auction shops.

Works in public collections

  • Brighton Art Gallery: Gray and silver flowers in a vase
  • Museum and Art Gallery, Hastings (Sussex): Parkland in Summer
  • Tate Britain , London: The Reading Girl , 1886/1887
  • Government Art Collection, London: Rochester Harbor, a September afternoon

literature

  • Andreas Klimt: General Artist Lexicon. Bio / bibliographical index A – Z, volume 8. KG Saur, 2000, ISBN 978-3-598-23910-6 .
  • Frederick Wedmore: Some of the Moderns. Virtue and Co., London 1909.
  • Anna Gruetzner Robins, in Norma Broude (Ed.): World Impressionism. Harry N Abrams, New York 1990, p. 76.
  • Kenneth McConkey: Impressionism in Britain. Barbican Art Gallery and Yale University Press, London 1995.
  • James Beechey, Roger Plant (inlet): Theodore Roussel, 1847–1926, Paintings, Drawings and Prints. Michael Parkin Gallery, London 1997.

Web links

Commons : Théodore Roussel  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Eva Mongi-Vollmer, in: Naked! Women views. Painter's intentions departure for modernity. Hatje Cantz, Ostfildern 2003, ISBN 3-7757-1384-0 , p. 138.
  2. ↑ April 16, 1887 edition, p. 527, quoted from Alison Smith (Ed.): Prudery and Passion, the Nude in the Victorian Age. Tate Gallery, London 2001, p. 252.
  3. ^ Jill Berk Jiminez, Joanna Banham: Dictionary of Artists' Models. Taylor & Francis, 2001, ISBN 978-1-5795-8233-3 . P. 425. (also on Google Books)
  4. ^ Theodore Casimir Roussel at artnet .
personal data
SURNAME Roussel, Théodore
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Roussel, Théodore Casimir (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Franco-British painter and printmaker
DATE OF BIRTH March 23, 1847
PLACE OF BIRTH Lorient , Brittany
DATE OF DEATH April 23, 1926
Place of death Hastings