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Paul
Gauguin (1884-1903)
Vision
After The Sermon (Jacob Wrestling with an Angel)
(oil on canvas, 1888)
National
Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh
The
Roots of Fauvism
Fauvism
has its roots in the post-impressionist
paintings of Paul Gauguin. It was his use of symbolic
colour that pushed art towards the style of Fauvism.
Gauguin proposed that colour had a symbolic vocabulary which
could be used to visually translate a range of emotions.
In 'Vision after the Sermon' where Gauguin depicts Jacob
wrestling with an angel, he paints the background a flat
red to emphasise the mood and subject of the sermon: Jacob's
spiritual battle fought in a blood red field of combat.
Gauguin believed that colour had a mystical quality that
could express our feelings about a subject rather than simply
describe a scene. By breaking the established descriptive
role that colour had in painting, he inspired the younger
artists of his day to experiment with new possibilities
for colour
in art.
Two
Fauvist Artists
Henri
Matisse (1869-1954)
The
Open Window, Collioure
(oil on canvas, 1905)
The
National Gallery of Art, Washington
At
the start of the 20th century, two young artists, Henri
Matisse and André Derain formed the basis of
a group of painters who enjoyed painting pictures with outrageously
bold colours. The group were nicknamed 'Les Fauves' which
meant 'wild beasts' in French. Their title was coined by
the art critic Louis Vauxcelles who was amused by the exaggerated
colour in their art. At the Salon d'automne of 1905 he entered
a gallery where Les Fauves were exhibiting their paintings.
Surprised by the contrast with a typical renaissance sculpture
that stood in the centre of this room, he exclaimed in irony,
"Donatello au mileau des fauves!" (
Donatello in the middle of the wild beasts! ). The
name stuck.
In
1905, Matisse and Derain went to stay in the port of Collioure
in the south of France and the pictures that they painted
there revolutionised attitudes towards colour
in art. The sheer joy of expression that they achieved
through their liberated approach to colour was a shot in
the arm for the art of painting.
In
Matisse's painting 'The Open Window, Collioure' colour is
used at its maximum intensity. The window frames, clay flower
pots and masts on the yachts have all been painted in a
blazing red. These are a bold complement to the range of
greens that punctuate the painting. In order to arrange
the various colours of the work into an effective composition
he creates a counterchange between the greenish wall on
the left and its reflected colour in the right hand window,
with the purple wall on the right and its reflected colour
in the left hand window. To unify the interior/exterior
relationship of space, the dense spectrum of colours used
inside the room is echoed more sparingly in the distant
view through the window.
At
first glance, the apparent freedom of his style seems to
deny any skill or technique, but when you begin to analyse
his effective use of visual elements you start to realise
that there is an instinctive sensibility at work. The key
to his success in using such exaggerated colours was the
realisation that he had to simplify his drawing. He understood
that if he intensified the quality of colour for expressive
effect, he must reduce the amount of detail used in drawing
the shapes and forms of the image. By applying the same
kind of simplification and spontaneity to his drawing and
brushwork, Matisse was amplifying the sense of joy that
he had achieved through colour. He wrote, "We move
towards serenity through the simplification of ideas and
form.......Details lessen the purity of lines, they harm
the emotional intensity, and we choose to reject them. It
is a question of learning - and perhaps relearning the 'handwriting'
of lines. The aim of painting is not to reflect history,
because this can be found in books. We have a higher conception.
Through it, the artist expresses his inner vision."
André
Derain (1880-1954)
The
Pool of London
(oil on canvas, 1906)
The
Tate Gallery, London
In
1906, after the success of the Salon d'automne exhibition
of the previous year, André Derain was commissioned
by Ambroise Vollard, the french art dealer, to create a
series of paintings about London. The subject had been previously
tackled by Whistler and Monet who had focused on the foggy
atmosphere of the industrial city. Derain's vision was a
radical departure from this traditional view as he painted
the capital in a palette more suited to a Mediterranean
holiday resort. Altogether he produced thirty paintings
in what has become a very popular series depicting many
views along the Thames.
Derain's
manages to balance the expressive and descriptive qualities
of colour in 'The Pool of London'. He uses the conflict
between warm
and cool colours to express the noise and activity of
this busy dockyard. An illusion of depth in the painting
is created by using stronger and warmer tones in the foreground,
which gradually become weaker and cooler towards the background.
This organised arrangement of tones in a landscape is called
Aerial
Perspective. The drawing of the image is typically simplified
into shapes and forms whose details can be conveyed by unmodified
brushstrokes of roughly the same size. This gives the painting
an overall unity that you would not expect in a composition
of such conflicting colours.
Fauvism
and Beyond
Henri
Matisse and André Derain may be the two most important
figures associated with the Fauve movement, but other great
artists such as Maurice de Vlaminck, Albert Marquet, Georges
Rouault, Raoul Dufy and the cubist
Georges Braque all contributed their own variations to the
style.
Fauvism
was not a formal movement with a manifesto of rules and
regulations. It was more an instinctive coming together
of artists who wished to express themselves by using bold
colours, simplified drawing and expressive brushwork. 'Les
Fauves' simply believed that colour had a spiritual quality
which linked directly to your emotions and they loved to
use it at the highest possible pitch.
Within
a few years, Fauvist techniques were adopted and developed
by the German
Expressionists and their various splinter groups. Fauvism
was gradually subsumed into the canon of modern art, but
its influence liberated the use of colour for future generations
of artists, who ultimately explored colour as an abstract
subject in its own right.
Fauvism
Notes
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Fauvism
was a style of painting developed in France at the beginning
of the 20th century by Henri
Matisse and André Derain.
Art
Appreciation
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