Author: Odilon Redon

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ISBN: 978-1-68325-663-2

Odilon Redon

 

 

 

 

Odilon Redon

(1840-1916)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Art is a state of being, a memory of expansive life, and imagine that we, restricted and weak, are in need of its support.”

— Odilon Redon

Contents

Biography

Childhood

Artistic Education

1867 – 1978: Ideas about Art

1878 – Voyage to Belgium and Holland

List of Illustrations

Biography

20 April 1840: Odilon Redon is born in Bordeaux; he is sent to live with a nanny and his uncle due to ill health. He returns to live with his parents at 11 years of age.

1851: Odilon is awarded a drawing prize at school.

1852: The young Redon does his first communion.

1855: First drawing lessons with the painter and watercolourist Stanislas Gorin with whom he discovers the works of Jean-François Millet, Jean-Baptiste Corot, Gustave Moreau, and Eugène Delacroix.

1857: His parents send him to Paris to study architecture. He divides his time between Paris and Bordeaux. He befriends the botanist Armand Clavaud who introduces him to Charles Baudelaire, Charles Darwin, Gustave Flaubert, and Edgar Allan Poe.

1862: Redon fails his architecture exams at the École des Beaux-Arts.

1864: The young painter joins Jean-Léon Gérôme in his studio but the two artists do not understand each other artistically.

1865: In Bordeaux, Redon completes an apprenticeship with the painter and engraver Rodolphe Bresdin who introduces him to the art of printing and engraving.

1870: He joins the army to take part in the battles of the Loire Valley during the Franco-Prussian war.

1870-1895: Redon works primarily with charcoal and lithography; he draws imaginary subjects which he calls his “noirs”.

1878: First trip to Belgium and Holland. Redon sees the work of other artists such as Hals, Rubens, Rembrandt, and Dürer.

1879: Redon’s first album of lithographies In the Dream. This was followed by other albums such as To Edgar Allan Poe, The Origins, and Hommage to Goya.

1880: Odilon Redon marries Camille Falte, from Réunion island, in Paris.

1884: He exhibits at the first Independent Artist’s Salon. Huysmans publishes Against Nature with a section dedicated to Odilon Redon.

1886: Birth of Redon’s first son. He dies aged just six and a half months.

1889: Birth of Redon’s second son, Redon finds happiness again. His first exhibition is in Holland at the Nederlandsche Etsclub in Amsterdam.

1890’s: Odilon Redon abandons his “noirs” and sets to work with colour using oil and pastels.

1894: First big retrospective at the Durand-Ruel gallery. It is described as an artistic manifestation.

1899: He is introduced to the Nabis by Maurice Denis.

1904: The state of France buys his painting Closed Eyes for the Musée du Luxembourg. An entire room is dedicated to Redon at the Autumn Salon and is a public success.

1913: André Mellerio publishes a catalogue of his etchings and lithographs. The same year, the Armory Show in New York displays 40 pieces of his art.

6 July 1916: Odilon Redon dies aged 72 due to a pulmonary oedema.