Maurice Denis

Maurice Denis, born on November 25, 1870 in Granville (Manche), died in Paris on November 13, 1943, is a Nabi painter, decorator, engraver, theorist and historian of the French art. He is also a member of the Symbolist and Les Nabis movements. His theories contributed to the foundations of cubism, fauvism, and abstract art.

After studying at the Lycee Condorcet where he met Édouard Vuillard, Paul Sérusier and Ker-Xavier Roussel, Maurice Denis trained in the Louvre where Fra Angelico's works determined his vocation as a Christian painter, followed by the discovery of Pierre Puvis de Chavannes. He studied at the School of Fine Arts and the Julian Academy at the same time in 1888, but soon left the first, considering it too academic. He met that same year Paul Sérusier who offered him his painting, The Talisman. With the latter he founded the group of the Nabis and became its theorist. Detached or not of Christianity, the Nabis sought spiritual ways in contact with philosophies and doctrines tinged with the Orient, Orphism and esotericism. In 1892, at the Salon des Independants, he presented an enigmatic painting, Easter Mystery (Morning), signed in the lower right of the monogram "Maud" which adds to the mystery of the work.

Denis discovers the painting of Paul Gauguin, whose influence will be decisive for the continuation of his work, at the Universal Exhibition of 18 He acquires one of his paintings in 1903, the Self-Portrait to the Yellow Christ Paris, Musée d'Orsay).

In the meantime, he met Marthe Meurier in 18. She was initially his model for many paintings, then his wife a year later. They have several children, including Anne-Marie Poncet-Denis.

He defines in an article in the journal Art et Critique what he calls "neo-traditionalism", in his sentence, which is still famous as the profession of faith of the aesthetic nabie, often interpreted as an intuition of what will be the " Abstraction: "Remember that a painting, before being a battle horse, a naked woman or some anecdote, is essentially a flat surface covered with colors in a certain order assembled. Beyond the work of Denis, this sentence will remain as one of the first definitions of modern art releasing the painting from the mimetic representation, to the iconographic aspect.

From 1890, he returned to a more decorative art, painting large panels for the dwellings of several patrons, including Gabriel Thomas's house.

In 1891, he met Henry Lerolle who bought him a first painting, ordered a ceiling, and received him at his home. The young painter met musician Ernest Chausson, who in turn commissioned three ceilings for his Parisian mansion on the Boulevard de Courcelles, collector Arthur Fontaine, and Denys Cochin, who commissioned him La Légende de Saint Hubert. Henry Lerolle presents him to the gallerist Paul Durand-Ruel, the young artist Nabi is launched. He began a correspondence with Jacques-Émile Blanche

In 1892, Maurice Denis abandoned the traditional iconography for a more personal one, strongly inspired by the symbolist poetry and the epic poetry of the Middle Ages. He introduces the image of the woman into paradisiacal gardens in which the nuances and the suavity of the tones reveal the dreamy atmosphere of the place. He often takes his wife Martha for female model in his paintings.

He discovers Italy, his home of heart, in the company of his wife and Ernest Chausson, with whom he stays in Fiesole, in the Papiniano villa, on the heights of Florence. He painted a series of landscapes during ten journeys. His style evolves gradually, the painter introduces a certain model, returning to a classic tradition of perspective of the decoration, in, for example, the Landscape with the Green Trees or the Beeches of Kerduel of 1893, a landscape of spring of 18

From 1898, he tackled the theme of the Bathers during several visits to Perros-Guirec in Brittany where he bought the villa Silencio. In the decade of 1900, along with Lucien Simon, Edmond Aman-Jean, André Dauchez, George Desvallières and Charles Cottet, he was part of a group of young painters nicknamed "Black Band" by art critics because they rejected light canvases Of the Impressionists. In 1906 he traveled with Ker-Xavier Roussel in Provence and on the coast, where the light of the seaside allows him to exalt the colors and to highlight the violence that often emanates from these legends

At that time, Denis met the engraver Jacques Beltrand. The two men became friends and Beltrand became, with his brothers Camille and Georges, the exclusive interpreter of the painter, engraving for him many of his works on wood. Until the death of Denis, a total of 23 books will be illustrated.

Maurice Denis resided a large part of his life in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, using the premises of an old hospital belonging to the parish. He built a workshop there in 1912, and became the owner of the premises, which he renamed the "Priory", from 19 His success is then international, it is at the top of his notoriety.

The war and the death of his wife, on August 22, 1919, after many years of illness, reinforce its action for a Christian art. He devoted himself to the decoration of the chapel of his priory by frescoes, the design of stained-glass windows, and furniture, on the theme of Saint Martha. Although it was unfinished, it was inaugurated on 25 March 19. It was used several times for religious ceremonies and the painter married several of his children. In the same year, he married Élisabeth Graterolle.

He taught at the Ranson Academy, from 1908 to 19 He founded the Ateliers d'art sacré with George Desvallières in 1919, and formed a whole generation of young painters, alongside the fauvist painter Victor Dupont. Its official recognition reached its apogee after the end of the First World War, several retrospective exhibitions are devoted to it (Venice Biennale in 1922, pavilion of Marsan in Paris in 1924).

He was supported by several patrons and Étienne Moreau-Nélaton acquired one of his works, Amour, Foi, Espérance (1916), which he donated to the Louvre4 in 1919 to commemorate the death of his son, who died for France in 19 Catholic, a member of the Dominican Third Order, while feeling close to the Franciscan spirit, he interpreted themes full of tenderness.

Politically, Maurice Denis is close to the French Action, a royalist movement, which he leaves after the condemnation of the movement by Rome. When the Dreyfus affair broke out, at the end of the nineteenth century, like the painters Edgar Degas, Auguste Renoir and Jean-Louis Forain, it was part of moderate anti-Dreyfus and anti-Semitic artists.

In 1941, under the Vichy regime, he was appointed, along with Jacques Beltrand, a member of the Professional Organization Committee for the Graphic and Plastic Arts.

He died on November 13, 1943, overthrown by a truck. His tomb is in the old cemetery of Saint-Germain-en-Laye.

works:
The Resurrection of Lazare, 1919, 130 cm x 160 cm, exhibited in Paris in 1920 at the Modern Christian Art Exhibition at the Pavillon de Marsan. Work in the fresco of the chapel of the Priory in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, in 1922, in a smaller and inverted composition
The Virgin of the Folgoët (1930, museum of the fine arts of Quimper)
Maurice Denis: The Communion of Joan of Arc (1909), oil on canvas, museum of the fine arts of Lyon)
Maurice Denis: The Virgin of the Folgoët (1930), museum of the fine arts of Quimper)
Maurice Denis, Self-portrait in front of the Priory (1921), Saint-Germain-en-Laye, departmental museum Maurice-Denis "Le Prieuré".
Nativity (circa 1876), oil on canvas, 95 × 89 cm, Toulouse, Musée des Augustins.
The Catholic Mystery (1889), oil on canvas, 97 × 143 cm, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Maurice-Denis departmental museum "Le Prieuré".
Madame Ranson in the cat (1892), oil on canvas, 89 × 45 cm, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Maurice-Denis departmental museum "Le Prieuré".
Portrait of Yvonne Lerolle (1897), oil on canvas, 170 × 110 cm, Paris, Musée d'Orsay.
Maternity in front of the sea or Maternity in Pouldu (1899, museum of the fine arts of Pont-Aven)
Breakfast (1901), oil on cardboard, 51,3 × 66,5 cm, Frankfurt am Main, Städel Institute of Art.
Baigneuses at Perros-Guirec (about 1909), oil on canvas, 98 × 122 cm, Paris, Petit Palais.
Cathedral of Saint-Corentin of Quimper: mosaic of Charles Wasem following a carton of Maurice Denis (1923)
Saint Georges with the red rocks, 1910 (Museum of Fine Arts of Angers).
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