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The art of Pastel from Degas to Redon.Petit palais. 15 September 2017 to 08 April 2018
Hi folks!
It’s been a long time since the Little Art Seeker didn’t give you news from Paris.Today the sun is shining over Paris and we’re in the mood for a new exhibition.The Petit Palais ,the fine art museum of the city of Paris created during the Belle Epoque offers us until April 2018 a gorgeous exhibition dedicated to the art of Pastel.The Little Art seeker saw it for you!!!
The 120 pastels displayed in the exhibition all belong to the petit Palais which made a choice over the 221 of its collection.It shows you hidden treasures from great figures of the 19th and 20th century such as Berthe Morisot,Auguste Renoir,Paul Gauguin,Mary Cassat but also works from symbolists as Odilon Redon or Lucien Lévy-Dhurmer.
The great era for pastel was in the 18th century and we face the beautiful portrait by Mme Vigee Le Brun representing a young Russian princess at the beginning of the exhibition,it will continue in the last quarter of the 19th century and will cross a revival in the early years of the 20th.
A French society of the French pastellists was created in 1885 and it had a pavillion at the 1889 world’s fair in Paris!!!The success was there!
Pastel was used for every aspect of modern life in popular and intimate scenes calling for a new simple;spontaneous treatment. .A painter named Paul-Albert Bartholomé gives us a very realistic portrait of a beggar woman using the colours in vigour in nature as his predecessors had done centuries before.
Some painters like Renoir or Berthe Morisot chose to show us scenes of privacy where children are represented with love and poetry.
From left to right :Renoir: Berthe Morisot and her daughter.1894.Berthe Morisot:In the park..1874
The Little Art Seeker loves the pastels from Mary Cassat who represents a little girl watching the viewver or gives us a moving portrait of one of her close friend the banker Moîse Dreyfus.Seated in his armchair with one book in his hand which seems to be on the verge to fall, he faces us in his dark suit surrounded by a bright light and his laughing eyes.The artist is so talented it seems to us these are beautiful pictures of another time. Children are as a matter of fact very much inspiring for the pastellists.
From top to bottom: Margot Lux and Moise Dreyfus by Mary Cassat .Sara with her dog.1901;Mary Cassat and Portrait of Yvonne Gouverné .Charles Léandre .1893.
The aristocratic and bourgeois elite loved the subtle touch of the pastel and everyone at the end of the 19th century wished to have his portrait done by a great artist. Some French painters in the tradition of the great James Tissot became virtuoso portrayers of Parisian elegance .
From left to right :Portrait of Aristide Briant.Marcel Baschet.1916.James Tissot.Berthe.1883.James Tissot :.the newspaper.1883.Charles Léandre.Yvonne Gouverné.1893
The last part of the exhibition is dedicated to the symbolists painters.They loved the pastel for its colours and for sometimes the mysteries it conveyed to their own universe .We were amazed by the red figures of Beethoven and his muses imagined by the symbolist painter Lucien Levy Dhurmer but also by trhe christic characters from the wonderful French symbolist Odilon Redon.
Some modern painters give a new focus on the use of the pastel in the 20th century and we leave the Petit Palais with a tremendous energy taken in all these beautiful artworks.So if you are in Paris ,run to see this exceptional exhibition the little art seeker warmly recommends it !