Les Nabis | Art history and Sitemap

Ambitious decorative painting enjoyed a resurgence in Europe from the late 1880s through the early twentieth century.

In Paris, Pierre Bonnard, Maurice Denis and Édouard Vuillard were among the most influential artists to embrace decoration as painting’s primary function.

Their works celebrate pattern and ornament, challenge the boundaries that divide fine arts from crafts, and, in many cases, complement the interiors for which they were commissioned.

Disaffected with the rigidly representational painting methods taught at the Académie Julian, Bonnard and Denis joined with other like-minded students in the fall of 1888 to form a brotherhood called the “Nabis”, a Hebrew word meaning “prophets”.

Jens Ferdinand Willumsen | Symbolist / Expressionist painter

Jens Ferdinand Willumsen (1863-1958) was a Danish painter, sculptor, graphic artist, architect and photographer.

He became associated with the movements of Symbolism and Expressionism.

J. F. Willumsen was born in Copenhagen, Denmark.

He was the son of Hans Willumsen and Ane Kirstine.

Félix Vallotton | Landscapes and seascapes

Vallotton's landscapes and seascapes avoided conventional views and techniques, and presented unusual viewpoints and perspectives.

The scene is sometimes seen from above, with the horizon very high in the picture, or without the sky being visible at all.

The forms are simplified, and the figures are often small and almost unrecognizable.

Felix-Vallotton | The Ball, 1899 | Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Felix Vallotton | Still life with gladioli, 1924

Félix Vallotton's still life paintings are characterized by their formal simplicity, striking compositions, and a cool, detached sensibility.

While still lifes were a minor subject for him earlier in his career, they became prominent in his work from around 1910 onwards.

In his later years, painting in his studio in Honfleur, Vallotton concentrated particularly on still lifes, particularly flowers, fruits and vegetables, very carefully arranged and painted with extreme precision.

Félix Vallotton | Figures and Portraits

Félix Edouard Vallotton (1865-1925) was a Swiss /French painter and printmaker associated with Les Nabis.

Vallotton was recognized as a very accomplished portrait painter, and painted portraits of many of the leading figures in the arts of his time.

His early work included a portrait of his fellow Nabi Édouard Vuillard.

The portraits of Vallotton featured both precision and a certain cold realism.

Pierre Bonnard: "Art will never be able to exist without nature".

Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947) was a French painter, illustrator and printmaker, known especially for the stylized decorative qualities of his paintings and his bold use of color.

A founding member of the Post-Impressionist group of avant-garde painters Les Nabis, his early work was strongly influenced by the work of Paul Gauguin, as well as the prints of Hokusai and other Japanese artists.

Bonnard was a leading figure in the transition from Impressionism to Modernism.

He painted landscapes, urban scenes, portraits and intimate domestic scenes, where the backgrounds, colors and painting style usually took precedence over the subject.

Maurice Denis | Les Nabis Group

Even today Maurice Denis' (1870-1943) place in the history of art remains unspecified. Known as the "Nabi of the beautiful icons", he is celebrated alongside Vuillard and Bonnard as one of the most importan Nabi painters, a founder of the movement and its brilliant theoretician.

Everyone remembers his famous dictum of 1890 when he was twenty years old and unknown. "Remember that a painting – before being a battle horse, an anecdote of some sort is essentially a flat surface covered with colours, put together in a certain order".

Felix Vallotton (1865-1925) | Nabi Painter

Félix Vallotton was a Franco-Swiss painter of portraits, figures, interiors and landscapes, wood-engraver, lithographer, sculptor and writer.

Born in Lausanne. Went to Paris in 1882 and studied at the Académie Julian under J. Lefebvre. Repaired and copied Old Master paintings; admired Holbein, Poussin and Ingres.

Concentrated mainly on wood-engraving 1891-1897, primarily portraits and scenes from everyday life treated with sardonic humour.

Édouard Vuillard | Post-Impressionist painter

Jean-Édouard Vuillard (1868-1940) was a French painter and printmaker.

Born in 1868 in Cuiseaux, a sleepy commune in the Saône-et-Loire region of Bourgogne in eastern France, it was assumed that Jean-Édouard Vuillard would follow in his father's footsteps and join the military.

But when he was 10 years old his family moved to Paris, where his eyes were opened to the arts and academia.

Awarded a scholarship to the prestigious Lycée Condorcet, Vuillard met Ker-Xavier Roussel and Maurice Denis, with whom he would become lifelong friends.

Paul Serusier | Symbolist / Post-impressionist painter

Paul Sérusier, in full Louis-Paul-Henri Sérusier (born November 9, 1864, Paris-died October 6, 1927, Morlaix, France), French Post-Impressionist painter and theorist who was instrumental in the formation of the short-lived, but highly influential, late 19th-century art movement known as the Nabis.

The group was noted for its expressive use of colour and pattern in the mode of Paul Gauguin. Sérusier’s early paintings featuring the people and landscapes of Brittany are noteworthy for their muted, contemplative mood, which the artist achieved by using firm contours and blocks of unmodulated colour.

Le Talisman, 1888, Paris, musée d'Orsay.

Paul Sérusier | Pittore post-impressionista

Paul Sérusier (Parigi, 9 novembre 1864 - Morlaix, 7 ottobre 1927) è stato un pittore francese post-impressionista, associato al movimento dei Nabis.

Nacque da una famiglia benestante di ceto medio e suo padre, un uomo d'affari che lavorava nell'industria del profumo, si assicurò che ricevesse un'educazione classica. Nel 1875, Sérusier fu ammesso al liceo Condorcet dove studiò filosofia classica, greco, latino e scienze. Ricevette i suoi due diplomi nel 1883, di filosofia e di scienze.

Nel 1885, dopo aver lavorato per un breve periodo nella società di un amico del padre, entrò alla prestigiosa Académie Julian per studiare arte.

Di carattere gentile, simpatico, fece subito amicizia sia con gli studenti sia con i professori.

La sua amicizia con Maurice Denis data da quest'epoca. Il primo successo giunse nel 1888 con Le Tisserand (Il Tessitore) ispirato al naturalismo fotografico e per questa opera ricevette una menzione al Salon des Indépendants.

Edouard Vuillard | Les Nabis Group

Édouard Vuillard, in full Jean-Édouard Vuillard (born Nov. 11, 1868, Cuiseaux, France-died June 21, 1940, La Baule), French painter, printmaker, and decorator who was a member of the Nabis group of painters in the 1890s.

He is particularly known for his depictions of intimate interior scenes.

Vuillard studied art from 1886-1888 at the Académie Julian and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris.

Do Fournier, 1951 | Les Nabis reminiscence

French Artist Do Fournier was born in the ancient town of Guerande, Brittany, France.

She began her career as a successful illustrator, and in 1984 changed her focus to the creation of her own paintings.

Her works were so well received, that numerous prestigious exhibitions were mounted in her native France, and she has frequently been invited to exhibit at the Salon d’Automne, Paris.

Édouard Vuillard | The Post-Impressionist flowers

In October 1888, Jean-Édouard Vuillard joined the Nabis and contributed to their exhibitions at the Gallery of Le Barc de Boutteville.

Later he shared a studio with other fellow member of the Nabis, Pierre Bonnard and Maurice Denis.

In the early 1890s he worked for the Théâtre de l'Oeuvre of Lugné-Poë designing settings and programs.