Cloisonnisme (1888-1894)

Introduction and History

In French painting, the term "cloisonnism" (after the French for "partition") describes a style of expressionism associated, in particular, with Emile Bernard (1868-1941), Louis Anquetin (1861-1932) and Paul Gauguin (1848-1903).

Based on a two-dimensional pattern, featuring large patches of bright colour enclosed within thick black outlines, in the manner of medieval cloisonné enamelling or stained glass, the word Cloisonnism was first coined in 1888 by the art critic Edouard Dujardin.

One of the lesser known modern art movements, albeit an influential style of Post-Impressionist painting, the distinctive characteristics of Cloisonnism were its areas of pure colour (devoid of most shading or 3-D modelling effects) which gave it a strong two-dimensional appearance.

Émile Bernard

Paul Cézanne | Corrispondenza con Émile Bernard

Aix, 27 giugno 1904

Mio caro Bernard,

ho ricevuto la vostra del... che ho lasciato in campagna. Se ho tardato a rispondervi, è perché sono soggetto a disturbi cerebrali, che mi impediscono di agire liberamente. Resto sotto l'urto delle sensazioni e, malgrado l'età, inchiodato alla pittura.

Il tempo è bello, ne approfitto per lavorare; bisognerebbe fare dieci buoni studi, e venderli cari, visto che gli amatori ci speculano sopra.

Ieri è arrivata qui una lettera indirizzata a mio figlio, che la signora Brémond [la governante di Cézanne] ritiene sia vostra; gliel'ho inviata in rue Duperré 16, Parigi, IX distretto. Sembra che Vollard abbia dato qualche giorno fa una serata danzante, in cui si è molto gozzovigliato. C'era tutta la giovane scuola, sembra, Maurice Denis, Vuillard eccetera. Si sono incontrati Paul e Joachim Gasquet. Credo che la cosa migliore sia lavorare molto. Voi siete giovane, realizzate e vendete.

Paul Cézanne | Figure e Lettere

Durante la sua vita il pittore Paul Cézanne ha tenuto molta corrispondenza - oltre 250 lettere, scritte a familiari, amici, colleghi artisti e mercanti, e che abbracciano le principali figure culturali della fine del XIX secolo.

Corrispondenza con Émile Bernard (French Symbolist painter, 1868-1941)

Aix en Provence, 15 aprile 1904

Caro signor Bernard,

"quando riceverete questa mia, avrete molto probabilmente già ricevuto una lettera dal Belgio, o almeno lo spero, indirizzata in rue Boulegon. Sono felice della testimonianza di simpatia artistica che avete voluto gentilmente offrirmi con la vostra lettera.

Permettetemi di ripetere quello che vi dicevo qui: trattare la natura secondo il cilindro, la sfera, il cono, il tutto posto in prospettiva, in modo che ogni lato di un oggetto o di un piano si diriga verso un punto centrale.

Lord Frederic Leighton | Victorian-era painter

Frederic Leighton, Baron Leighton, also called Sir Frederic Leighton, Baronet (born Dec. 3, 1830, Scarborough, Yorkshire, Eng.-died Jan. 25, 1896, London), academic painter of immense prestige in his own time.

After an education in many European cities, he went to Rome in 1852, where his social talents won him the friendship of (among others) the English novelist William Makepeace Thackeray, the French novelist George Sand, and the English poet Robert Browning.

Leighton’s painting Cimabue’s Madonna, shown at the Royal Academy’s exhibition in 1855, was bought by Queen Victoria.

Nicolae Vermont | Genre painter

Romanian painter Nicolae Vermont 1866-1932 was one of the masters of Romanian Realist painting and one of the most interesting painters, muralists and draftsmen of his time, as many viewed him as an associate of Stefan Luchian.

He was a prolific and surprisingly innovative artist, with a strong, original style and manner and quite a broad choice of subjects, but he preferred landscapes and still lifes.

Vermont was one of the most interesting and influential voices of his generation, marking and changing the landscape of Romanian painting, as he always tried to offer something more, something new, to challenge rules and themes, to offer the viewer an artistic experience that was strikingly beautiful and shockingly fresh and alive. A great master and a great name.

Dora Wahlroos | En plein air painter

Anna Dorothée (Dora) Wahlroos (19 December 1870, Pori – 21 March 1947, Kauniainen) was a Finnish painter who participated in the painting movement en plein air towards the end of the 19th century.

Biography

She was born in Pori to province land surveyor Johan Henrik Wahlroos and Dorothée Augusta Henrietta Fehn.

She studied at the Turku Drawing School in 1886–1888 and under Victor Westerholm in 1889–1890. She was one of the artists who joined Westerholm in the artists colony at Önningeby on the island of Åland.

She was accepted to the Finnish Art Society in 1890–1891, where her class was taught by Gunnar Berndtson. In the Fall of 1890 she got engaged to sculptor Emil Wikström.

The two went to study together at Paris in 1891–1892.

Carlton Alfred Smith (1853-1946) | Genre painter

Carlton Alfred Smith, RBA RI ROI was a British watercolourist, oil painter and genre artist who often made images of cottage interiors showing domestic life and figures in cottage interiors in a romantic manner towards the end of the nineteenth century.

He was the son of a steel engraver and spent some of his early years being educated in France. The artist also studied at the Slade School of Art, winning gold and silver medals.

He became one of the most technically accomplished watercolorists of the late Victorian period. With Charles Edward Wilson (fl. 1890-1930) he moved from London to join the artistic community founded by Myles Birket Foster Allingham (1848-1926) in the towns or villages surrounding Witley in Surrey.

Marianne Stokes (1855-1927) | Victorian painter

Marianne Stokes, born Marianne Preindlsberger, was an Austrian painter. She settled in England after her marriage to Adrian Scott Stokes (1854-1935), the landscape painter, whom she had met in Pont-Aven. Stokes was considered one of the leading women artists in Victorian England.

Biography

Preindlsberger was born in Graz, Styria. She first studied in Munich under Lindenschmit, and having been awarded a scholarship for her first picture, Muttergluck, she worked in France under Pascal Adolphe Jean Dagnan-Bouveret (1852–1929), Colin and Gustave Courtois (1853-1923).