Edouard Vuillard [Paperback]

Guy Cogeval (Author), Edouard Vuillard (Author), National Gallery of Art (U. S.) (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0894682970 | ISBN-13: 978-0894682971 | Publication Date: January 2003

The illustrious career of Edouard Vuillard (1868-1940) spanned the fin de siecle and the first four decades of the 20th century. During that time, the French painter, printmaker and photographer created a large number of extraordinary works. This study of Vuillard's art presents some 100 works that should reveal the full range of his renowned artistic abilities. In a series of illustrated essays, the authors explore Vuillard's complex and diverse career, which began with his academic training in Paris in the late 1880s. By the early 1890s, Vuillard was painting the innovative and sensual Nabi paintings for which he is best known, characterised by complex patterns and vibrant colours. Vuillard was also beginning to paint provocative interiors and works associated with the avant-garde theatre. The volume concludes with an examination of Vuillard's sumptuous large-scale decorations, luminous landscapes and elegant portraits from the last decades of his career as well as a substantial selection of his pastels and prints, in addition to his photographs.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

A quiet man who lived with his beloved mother, the painter Édouard Vuillard applied his inventive talents to re-imagining bourgeois interiors as shifting planes of color and pattern. Admirers of his sensuous interior world will be bowled over by this sumptuous volume with its vivid narrative and 463 exquisite color reproductions. In Édouard Vuillard, Guy Cogeval discusses the artist's life and work with a passionate involvement that is rare in contemporary art writing. He describes how Vuillard's early work as a set designer apparently led him to stage manage family members, placing them in tense or confrontational tableaux that he memorialized in paint. Vuillard was an enthusiastic amateur photographer who favored the new handheld Kodak camera. An entire chapter is dedicated to the artist's charmingly artless snapshots of family and friends. In his later years, Vuillard utilized a more down-to-earth painting style in portraits of the rich and famous. While these paintings are often dismissed as conservative, Cogeval points out Vuillard's use of subtle details to comment on some of his sitters. Four other essayists treat themes ranging from "Vuillard and Ambiguity" to the effect of his annual summer vacations on his treatment of landscape, light and composition. This exceptional book accompanies an exhibition at the National Gallery of Art, in Washington, D.C., from Jan. 19 to April 20, 2004, which travels to Montreal, Paris, and London. --Cathy Curtis --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

The traveling exhibition on which this catalogue is based (it's now in Washington, D.C.) has been described as overstuffed in more than one review. But since one is not jostling for space or walking miles of galleries when perusing this volume, its bulk works in its favor, revealing in 463 color (and 95 b&w) reproductions the breadth of Vuillard's achievement, as well as its limits. The 334 works from the show begin in 1889, with Vuillard and Waroquy, a portrait of the artist and his friend ("of whom we know almost nothing") and plunge into the astonishing works of the 1890s, where Vuillard (along with Bonnard) took Impressionism in new directions. Cogeval, director of Montreal's Museum of Fine Arts, rightly devotes a good portion of the book to this period, providing ample sketches and studies to buttress the case for Vuillard's accomplishment, along with photos of the figures one often finds in the work (also part of the exhibit). After some uncertain mid-period works, the book presents a series of portraits from the 1930s that reveal Vuillard (1868-1940) to have been a "discreet observer of a certain modernity." That discretion, for some, may signal a dead end, but long enough looks at some of these late works reveal that "certain modernity" to have a lot in common with the denatured reality of lifestyle journalism. But whatever one's final opinion of the work, the book (which also includes four scholarly essays and a detailed chronology) allows a contemplation of it that was previously impossible.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 501 pages
• Publisher: Natl Gallery of Art (January 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0894682970
• ISBN-13: 978-0894682971
• Product Dimensions: 12.5 x 9.4 x 2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,617,969 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

33 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars From hesitation to a superb rating...., April 19, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Edouard Vuillard (Hardcover)

I had the opportunity to see this show at the National Gallery in Washington D.C. and am amazed at how well everything was represented both in the book and at the show. At first I wasn't going to buy the book but, after speaking with my painting professor, who has been collecting Vuillard books for over 30 years, state that this is THE most comprehensive book of Vuillard's work and probably has more information and work than all his other Vuillard books combined, well, that clenched it and I had to get the book. I am very, very glad I did.

22 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A reputation revived, March 2, 2003

By 

david burke (dartmouth, nova scotia Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Edouard Vuillard (Hardcover)

Vuillard has always attracted less attention than Bonnard and long been regarded as interesting but rather limited and restricted in his interests and subject matter, in short an 'intimiste'.

This strikingly well produced book in which the colour illustrations are among the best I have ever seen makes it possible to reconsider the artist quite thoroughly and demonstrates convincingly that he covered a far wider range of subjects and ideas than has hitherto been generally supposed. There is much in here that even those who have seen previous Vuillard exhibitions will find new.

My one complaint is the enormous size and weight of the book which certainly helps with the reproductions but makes it difficult to read the extremely useful text which carries (successfully) the argument for reconsideration. Be it noted that the reproductions are of such high quality that they recreate the feel of Vuillard's surfaces which are a great pleasure.

One of the finest art books I have ever seen and a major contribution.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An authoritative coverage of Vuillard's vast body of art, April 13, 2003

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Edouard Vuillard (Hardcover)

The career of this French painter and photographer spanned the first four decades of the 20th century and produced a wealth of works. Edouard Vuillard represents the most comprehensive and authoritative study of Vuillard's art, with over a hundred works covering the wide range of his creations and enjoying essays by the authors, who explore his career and influences. Though it's the catalog for an exhibition in Washington DC, Edouard Vuillard will also earn its own rightful place as an authoritative coverage of Vuillard's vast body of art.