THE JASON JACQUES GALLERY WILL BE CLOSED ON FRIDAY, JULY 4, 2008
IS ART NOUVEAU A STYLE?
Although the term 'Art Nouveau' is popularly used to designate the curvy, whiplash style of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, historians are less than certain of its meaning. Even at the time that 'L'Art Nouveau' was first introduced into common usage by Parisian tastemaker Siegfried Bing, its meaning was controversial. Was Art Nouveau a style or a movement? If it was a style, how could it possibly include works as diverse as geometric planters, biomorphic architecture, and pottery ornamented with despondent female nudes? If it was a movement, what was its ideology? Although some early critics found that Art Nouveau's lack of stylistic unity was evidence of hopeless confusion, one significant apologist found that stylistic and thematic variety was very much the point. It was Siegfried Bing himself who made this important argument in favor of Art Nouveau as neither a style nor a movement but as an opportunity for self expression.
The Art Nouveau field, he explained in the American publication, The Craftsman, in 1903, was 'a free soil upon which any one could build according to his own desires.' He brought readers back to the late 18th century to explain the late 19th century's need for a new art, theorizing that the shock of the French Revolution (1789) had ushered in a period of utter stagnation that persisted into the 1860s and '70s. When artists awakened to the need for a contemporary art, it was because they realized that society had been transformed by industrialization, mass-production, the rise of the middle class, the beginnings of Socialism, the opening of trade with Japan, and marketplace competition with the United States. This was a new world and a new world required required new art.
According to Bing, the initial movement began in England, under the influence of the Pre-Raphaelites and the ideas of John Ruskin, and was carried into practical affairs by William Morris. Later, the Belgians, led by Henri van de Velde, a professor of aesthetics from Brussels, devised the first truly modern formulas for the interior decoration of houses. Van de Velde, in fact, executed interiors for Bing's shop, L'Art Nouveau, which opened in Paris in 1895. The name of the shop was adopted as the name of a new art movement. Bing prescribed no single style. The field was open to the ingenuity and taste of the artists. The vanguard returned to Nature for inspiration and tried to follow the essential principles of utility, simplicity, organic design, and truthfulness to construction and materials.
One wonders why Bing failed to mention the influence of Japan on the spirit of the new. It was an odd omission considering that as an importer of Asian objets d'art he had been the principal figure in creating the craze for Japonism in France. According to Gabriel Weisberg in The Origins of L'Art Nouveau: The Bing Empire (Van Gogh Museum, 2005), by the mid-1870s Bing had realized that there was money to be made in Japanese art. He later toured the distant nation and made a sweep of the best objects, launched a monthly journal titled Le Japon Artistique, and organized traveling exhibitions throughout Europe and the United States to expand the market for his merchandise. After nearly 20 years at the center of the craze for all thing Japanese, Bing decided to add a new element to his business: he would deal in new merchandise, produced in Western nations but inspired by Nature and the Japanese depiction of nature.
In any event, Bing tells us that artists from throughout Europe, but mostly from France, began working in the spirit of the new, using various materials, striving for forms and decorations suitable for the modern age. As their predecessors had done in centuries past, they cultivated their own genius rather than copying from familiar and trite styles. Bing gathered together a selection of their work (which he had been cultivating) in his newly decorated gallery on the Rue de Provence, Paris.
Weisberg tells us that for the opening of his new shop Bing commissioned a bedroom from Maurice Denis; a waiting room from Edward Vuillard; a salon with wall-decoration from Paul-Albert Besnard; a boudoir from the Australian Charles Conder; a smoking room from the Belgians Henry Van de Velde and Georges Lemmen; and a sitting room and dining room, also from Van de Velde. Ceramics, dishes, lamps, textiles and rugs based on the same deign principles completed the model rooms. According to Bing, the exhibition 'was powerful enough to create a large following of recruits, impatient to enroll themselves beneath the banner displayed by the vanguard.' He was careful to point out that all Art Nouveau artists were not equally talented. Although he did not mention names, he clearly referred to Carabin (and others like him) when he ridiculed those who 'designed tables supported by nymphs with soft, sinuous bodies, or by strange figures savage in their symbolism, with muscles swollen and writhing.'.
Faulting art critics for failing in their professional duty, Bing rebuked them for offering no guidance concerning the new art. Instead of distinguishing between successful and unsuccessful works, they randomly showed all efforts, leaving readers completely adrift. No one seemed to take the subject seriously, Bing complained, concluding that future judges will all acknowledge the indelible mark of our epoch, without it being necessary for all our artists to concur in an absolute identity of style. Bing's future judges are today's art historians and they have partly fulfilled Bing's prophesy, acknowledging, even celebrating, the impact of Art Nouveau, but finding its definition persistently illusive. But all seem to agree on this: Art Nouveau artists wanted to quash the exhausted clichés of historicism by creating a new modern aesthetic. Since a desire to throw off the chains of tradition equals a desire for freedom, it is no surprise that these innovators adhered to no single style.
In theory, they strove for something entirely novel but in reality they had to look somewhere for inspiration. Quite openly, they relied upon a number of sources, reinterpreting, adapting, co-mingling, and sometimes even copying them to suit their aesthetic and technical needs. As Paul Greenhalgh has pointed out in Art Nouveau 1890-1914 (V & A Publications, 2000), the core sources that operated internationally were English -- the Arts and Crafts movement; European -- including Classicism, the Baroque, Rococo, Gothic styles and their revivals, regional folk art; and the exotic -- including the art of Islamic nations, China, Japan and the far flung colonies of European nations. In addition there were direct references to nature, ranging from the cosmic to the microscopic. And then there were various combinations, permutations, nationalistic, and personal variations. It has already taken several books to consider the entire field of Art Nouveau decorative arts. At the Jason Jacques Gallery, we focus primarily on the ceramics that were made between 1880 and 1915, the years that the new art -- whatever its name -- was emerging and at the height of its popularity.
FOCUS ON ERNEST CHAPLET (1835 -1909)
A pioneer in the artistic renewal that started in France in the 1870s, Ernest Chaplet created the bridge between the worlds of Asian and European ceramics. An art critic writing in the British journal The Studio, in 1897 said, 'Chaplet may truly be styled the father of the whole [French art pottery] movement: he it is who is the real restorer of a neglected, old-fashioned art, the secrets and methods of which seemed lost forever.'
Chaplet began his career in 1848 as an apprentice at Sevres, where he studied decoration, design and ceramics techniques under the painter Meyer Heine. Later, while working as a porcelain painter and faience decorator, he privately experimented with glazes and clay bodies. In the early 1870s, Chaplet developed barbotine decoration, a method of painting earthenware with liquid clay. This accomplishment inspired Haviland and Company to hire Chaplet to supervise production of barbotine ware for their firm. With more advanced technical facilities at his disposal, Chaplet was then able to increase the range of barbotine colors and achieve subtler background shading.
Several years later Chaplet, assisted by Albert-Louis Dammouse, directed the production of matte brown stoneware, helping to legitimize stoneware clay as an art medium. He made simple forms ornamented with Japanese-inspired designs in low relief and also painted in colored slips with outlines in gold. When Haviland withdrew its support in 1885, Chaplet took full control of the studio and continued production of glazed stoneware. It was at this time that he began his collaboration with the painter Paul Gaugin, a coup for the ceramist considering the painter's reputation as an innovator.
Between May and June 1886, Gaugin decorated stoneware vases and mugs from Chaplet's normal output with Breton scenes featuring landscapes with figures, sheep, or geese painted in distinctive colored glazes, within a dark outline. Gaugin also made freely modeled vases, mugs, and other objects in the studio's stoneware body. He worked with Chaplet intermittently until 1889 and then again between 1893 and 1895.
Drawing upon the philosophy of the English Arts and Crafts movement, Chaplet believed strongly in offering an alternative to mass-production by encouraging a creative workshop atmosphere, where a single individual would both design and create an object. Acting on his own beliefs, Chaplet became France's premiere studio potter. In 1889, he won a gold medal at the Paris Universal Exposition for producing the elusive Chinese sang de boeuf glaze. In the same year, he settled in Choisy-le-Roi and devoted himself to glaze research. After 1891 he achieved colors ranging from purple to white to celadon. As his glazes became more complex, requiring successive firings in different kiln atmospheres, his forms became simpler. He was working in this spirit in around 1900 when he created the Snowy Day Vase, pictured above. Chaplet ultimately came to believe that glaze alone provided sufficient decoration for the ceramic art of the new millennium. In 1904, Chaplet lost his eyesight and turned his studio over to his son-on-law, Emile Lenoble.
To see images of Chaplet ceramics, go to our home page, click on French Studio, and enter the name Chaplet in the search field.
UPCOMING EVENTS
Baltimore Summer Antiques Show: August 28 - 31
Maryland's largest antiques event, now in its 27th year, features 550 international dealers from the U.S, Canada, England, Germany, Italy, South America and Asia. For the thousands of patrons who attend each year, the attraction is the rare combination of variety, quality and affordability. The fine art and furniture is shown in elegant, room-setting displays. Jason Jacques will be bringing a selection of rare European Art Nouveau and Japonist ceramics that surpasses any museum collection in the U.S. Visit us at the largest summer indoor antiques avent in the country. Location: Baltimore Convention Center; Downtown at the Inner Harbor; One West Pratt Street (at the corner of Howard St.); West Pratt Street Entrance. To visit the show on the web, go to: www.baltimoresummerantiques.com.
The International Art + Design Fair: October 3 - 8, 2008, New York
Jason Jacques has been selected to appear as an exhibitor at The International Art + Design Fair, a carefully vetted event that prides itself on admitting only the top specialists in 20th century decorative arts. Jacques plans to bring a rare selection of early 20th century Rozenburg earthenware. With playful kaleidoscopic designs by T.A.C. Colenbrander, these pieces seem perfectly at home in the 21st century, reminding us that modernity is a subjective concept. The Park Avenue Armory is located only a few blocks south of the Jason Jacques Gallery, which will be open during the Fair. Plan to visit us at both places while you're in town. Tickets to the Armory show are sold at the door. Location: The Park Avenue Armory; Park Avenue at 67th Street, New York, NY 10065.
FOCUS ON ADRIEN DALPAYRAT (1844-1910)
During the 1890s Adrien Dalpayrat was so well known for his flambe pottery that the term 'Dalpayrat red' was coined to designate the distinctive glaze that coated his stoneware. Perfected in 1892, it was a deep and thick oxblood color, dappled or veined with greens, blues and yellows, on pieces in the form of gourds, fruits, and shapes derived from Japanese bottles. Dalpayrat unveiled his discovery that year at the prestigious Galerie Georges Petit in Paris, where he exhibited 50 stoneware pieces based on models by Alphonse Voisin-Delacroix. His success with stoneware was immediate, but he can hardly be considered an overnight success. His moments of fame came after a long period of study, travel, labor, and experimentation.
Pierre-Adrien Dalpayrat (he dropped Pierre as an adult) was born in Limoges almost 50 years earlier, the eighth child of a father who was a typographer specializing in missals. As a youngster with an interest in painting and design, he attended a local art school and subsequently trained at the Limoges Municipal School of Porcelain Painting. He married Marie Tallerie in 1866. The couple produced four sons, Albert, Adolphe, Hippolyte, and Paul, who were later involved in the ceramics business in varying degrees, and a daughter Julie Marguerite.
In the first decades of his career, Dalpayrat was a faience painter, working at six different manufactories between 1867 and 1888. The reasons for his apparent wanderlust likely included his desire to learn diverse techniques and his need to support a growing family. In 1870, he spent a brief period in London with his brother Louis, studying the art of enameling on copper at South Kensington.
In 1889, at the age of 45, he settled down near Paris in Bourg-la-Reine, a town with a long history of porcelain manufacture. At around this time, he dropped the designation of porcelain painter and began to identify himself as a ceramist or artist-ceramist. From that time forward, he devoted his time mostly to stoneware, which was then held in the highest esteem by French art potters. His sudden interest in the medium may well have been inspired by the well-publicized successes of Ernest Chaplet and Auguste Delaherche at the 1889 Paris Universal Exposition.
Dalpayrat soon found himself the proprietor of a booming atelier. In photographs from the period, he appears as a bewhiskered gentleman in a three-piece suit, among his younger, smock-clad workers. Dalpayrat's studio executed objects by Maurice Dufrene, designer of furniture, textiles, glassware, silverware, and ceramics. Dufrene was the director and manager of La Maison Moderne, an association of artists who worked together to create designs that could be produced in multiples. Prominent modelers in Dalpayrat's atelier included Jean Coulon, whose Symbolist pitcher La Nuit depicts an owl (an attribute of night), composed of recumbent female forms, Lucien Coudray, and Alphonse Voisin-Delacroix. By 1893, Dalpayrat had formed a partnership with Voisin-Delacroix. They received financial support from Adele Lesbros, a member of Voisin-Delacroix's extended family.
Working alone and with a variety of collaborators, Dalpayrat produced a wide range of shapes and decorations. His vases appear in simple shapes, including bottles, gourds, double gourds, and squares. Others vessels are complex and sculptural, appearing as twisted leaves or warty vegetables. A third group incorporates faces or figures, as appliques, reliefs, and three-dimensional sculptures. Not surprising in the ceramics of the era, the idealized female nude appears often. However the depiction of a partly devoured animal heart may be unique to Dalpayrat's oeuvre. As bizarre as it is, the subject would have been consistent with the contemporary interest in Symbolism and the occult. Dalpayrat's glazes were virtually endless variations on his Dalpayrat red, at times streaked or speckled with blue or brown, at other times dripped over an ochre glaze. In some instances, Dalpayrat combined his stoneware clay with kaolin, the key ingredient in porcelain. Metal mounts appear on some of his vases and others have been converted to lamp bases.
When his partnership with Voisin-Delacroix ended, Dalpayrat partnered with Lesbros, who invested 26,000 Francs in the venture. One of their joint undertakings was a monumental mantelpiece, purchased by the state for the Musee du Luxembourg. For Dalpayrat, designing the mantelpiece was an opportunity to apply to architectural ceramics the techniques that had built his reputation.
Most important among them was his facility with sumptuous flambe glazes, created by transmuting copper oxides at the atomic level through successive firings in oxygen-depleted and oxygen-rich kiln atmospheres. Unlike other master potters of his period, he built no school of followers. After his death in 1910, his sons carried on in his tradition but this too ceased with the death of Adolphe Dalpayrat in 1934.
To see images of Dalpayrat ceramics, go to our home page, click on French Studio, and enter the name Dalpayrat in the search field.
MUSEUM ACTIVITES
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
In December, 2007, the Metropolitan Museum of Art opened new galleries for 19th- and early 20th-century European paintings and sculpture. The renovated spaces feature the Museum's most beloved 19th-century paintings, which have been on permanent display in the past, as well as works by Bonnard, Vuillard, Soutine, Matisse, Picasso, and other early modern artists. Among the many additions is a full-room assembly of "The Wisteria Dining Room" a French art nouveau interior designed by Lucien Levy Dhurmer shortly before World War I. It is the only complete example of its kind in the United States. The dining room is furnished with appropriately styled decorative arts including a vase purchased from the Jason Jacques Gallery.
Levy-Dhurmer, like many of his contemporaries (such as Josef Hoffmann in Austria, Charles Rennie Mackintosh in Scotland, Frank Lloyd Wright in America, Victor Horta in Belgium, and Hector Guimard in France), worked as an ensemblier, conceiving interiors to be consistent works of art. One major difference, however, was that Levy-Dhurmer approached his projects as an artist rather than as an architect. Levy Dhurmer began his career as a pastel painter and before creating the Wisteria Dining room devoted several years to designing luster glazes and decorations for pottery produced by Clement Massier. Examples of Levy Dhurmer and Massier's work can be closely examined and acquired at the Jason Jacques gallery, only a few blocks from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Museum is located at 1000 Fifth Avenue at 82nd Street; 212-535-7710; www.metmuseum.org.
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