PAINTINGS, WATERCOLORS & DRAWINGS

BY

RAOUL DUFY

1877-1953

WILDENSTEIN

NEW YORK

1962

16 pages

7” x 10 1/4”

Raoul Dufy

Raoul Dufy (French: 3 June 1877 – 23 March 1953) was a French Fauvist painter. He developed a colorful, decorative style that became fashionable for ceramics and textile designs, as well as decorative schemes for public buildings. He is noted for scenes of open-air social events. He was also a draftsman, printmaker, book illustrator, scenic designer, furniture designer and a planner of public spaces.

Raoul Dufy

Raoul Dufy, before 1927

Born 3 June 1877

Le Havre, France

Died 23 March 1953 (aged 75)

Forcalquier, France

Education

École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts

Known for

Painting, drawing, design, printmaking

Notable work

La Fée Electricité (1937)

Movement

Fauvism, Impressionism, modernism, Cubism

Biography

Dufy was born into a large family at Le Havre, in Normandy. His younger brother, Jean Dufy, also became an artist. Dufy left school at the age of fourteen to work in a coffee-importing company. In 1895, aged 18, he started taking evening classes in art at Le Havre's École des Beaux-Arts (municipal art school). The classes were taught by Charles Lhuillier, who had been a student of the French portrait painter Ingres 40 years earlier. There Dufy met Raimond Lecourt [fr] and Othon Friesz, with whom he later shared a studio in Montmartre and maintained a lifelong friendship. During this period, Dufy primarily painted Norman landscapes in watercolors.

In 1900, after a year of military service, Dufy won a scholarship to the École Nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where again he crossed paths with Othon Friesz (he was also there when Georges Braque was studying). Dufy concentrated on improving his drawing skills and was profoundly influenced by the impressionist landscape painters, such as Claude Monet and Camille Pissarro. His first exhibition, at the Exhibition of French Artists, took place in 1901. Dufy was introduced to Berthe Weill in 1902 and showed his work in her gallery. He exhibited again in 1903, at the Salon des Indépendants. An early confidence boost came when the artist Maurice Denis bought one of his paintings. Dufy continued to paint, often in the vicinity of Le Havre and, in particular, on the beach at Sainte-Adresse, made famous by Eugène Boudin and Claude Monet. In 1904, he worked in Fecamp, on the English Channel (La Manche), with his friend Albert Marquet.

Henri Matisse's Luxe, Calme et Volupté, which Dufy saw at the Salon des Indépendants in 1905, directed his interests towards Fauvism. Les Fauves (the wild beasts) emphasized bright color and bold contours in their work. Dufy's painting reflected this aesthetic until about 1909, when contact with the work of Paul Cézanne led him to adopt a somewhat subtler technique. However, it was not until 1920, after he had flirted briefly with yet another style, Cubism, that Dufy developed his own distinctive approach. It involved skeletal structures arranged with foreshortened perspective, and the use of thin washes of color applied quickly, in a manner that came to be known as stenographic. Dufy's cheerful oils and watercolors depict events of the time period, such as yachting scenes, sparkling views of the French Riviera, chic parties and musical events. The optimistic, fashionably decorative and illustrative nature of much of Dufy's work has meant that his output has been less highly valued critically than the works of artists who have addressed a wider range of social concerns.

For the 1937 Exposition International in Paris, Dufy completed one of the largest paintings ever contemplated, a huge and immensely popular ode to electricity titled La Fée Electricité (painted in oil on plywood).

Dufy also acquired a reputation as an illustrator and commercial artist. He painted murals for public buildings and also produced a significant number of tapestries and ceramic designs. His plates appear in books by Guillaume Apollinaire, Stéphane Mallarmé and André Gide.

In 1909, Dufy was commissioned by Paul Poiret to design stationery for the house. After 1912, he designed textile patterns for Bianchini-Ferier, which were used for garments worn by Poiret and Charvet.

In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Dufy exhibited at the annual Salon des Tuileries in Paris. By 1950, his ability to paint was diminished when his hands were impaired by rheumatoid arthritis and he had to fasten a brush to his hand to work. In April he went to Boston to undergo an experimental treatment with cortisone and corticotropin, based on the work of Philip S. Hench. It proved successful, and some of his next works were dedicated to the doctors and researchers in the United States. In 1952 he received the grand prize for painting in the 26th Venice Biennale. Dufy died of intestinal bleeding at Forcalquier, France, on 23 March 1953, likely the result of his continuous treatment. He was buried near Matisse in the Cimiez Monastery Cemetery in Cimiez, a suburb of the city of Nice.