Édouard-Auguste Imer (23 December 1820,

Avignon Avignon (, ; ; oc, Avinhon, label=Provençal dialect, Provençal or , ; la, Avenio) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Vaucluse Departments of France, department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur Regions of France, region of So ...

13 June 1881,

Haarlem Haarlem (; predecessor of ''Harlem'' in English) is a city and municipality in the Netherlands. It is the capital of the province of North Holland. Haarlem is situated at the northern edge of the Randstad, one of the most populated metropoli ...

) was a French painter of Swiss ancestry. He travelled extensively, painting landscapes throughout Europe and North Africa.

Biography

His father, Julien Auguste Imer (1787-1861), was a manufacturer and President of the Chamber of Commerce. He and Édouard's mother, Adèle Jeanrenaud (1790-1869), were originally from

Neuchâtel , neighboring_municipalities= Auvernier, Boudry, Chabrey (VD), Colombier, Cressier, Cudrefin (VD), Delley-Portalban (FR), Enges, Fenin-Vilars-Saules, Hauterive, Saint-Blaise, Savagnier , twintowns = Aarau (Switzerland), Besançon (France), ...

. In 1846, he married Sophie Chaponnière (1822-1850), who died of a heart ailment; aged only twenty-seven. They had one daughter. Until his wife's death, he was a partner in his father's business. Having been exposed to art since he was a boy (his father was an amateur collector), he decided to study painting with Émile Loubon at the . Later, he studied in England and Germany and began exhibiting at the

Salon Salon may refer to: Common meanings * Beauty salon, a venue for cosmetic treatments * French term for a drawing room, an architectural space in a home * Salon (gathering), a meeting for learning or enjoyment Arts and entertainment * Salon (P ...

and would be a regular contributor until 1876. In 1849, he had made his first trip to Algeria, and became one of the first artists to paint there, rather than simply sketch. In 1853, he made an extended trip to

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with his friends,

Ernest Hébert Antoine Auguste Ernest Hébert (3 November 1817 – 5 December 1908) was a French academic painter. Biography Hébert was born in Grenoble, son of a notary in Grenoble, and moved in 1835 to Paris to study law. He simultaneously took art ...

and . He spent the winter of 1855 in Egypt, with

Jean-Léon Gérôme Jean-Léon Gérôme (11 May 1824 – 10 January 1904) was a French painter and sculptor in the style now known as academicism. His paintings were so widely reproduced that he was "arguably the world's most famous living artist by 1880." The ran ...

Léon Belly Léon Auguste Adolphe Belly (1827–1877) was a French Landscape art, landscape painter. Life Belly was born at Saint-Omer, St. Omer, in 1827. He studied under Constant Troyon, Troyon, and in 1849 visited Barbizon where he came under the influe ...

and

Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi ( , ; 2 August 1834 – 4 October 1904) was a French sculpture, sculptor and painting, painter. He is best known for designing ''Liberty Enlightening the World'', commonly known as the Statue of Liberty. Early life a ...

, who was there at the invitation of the newly formed

Suez Canal Company Suez ( ar, السويس '; ) is a seaport city (population of about 750,000 ) in north-eastern Egypt, located on the north coast of the Gulf of Suez (a branch of the Red Sea), near the southern terminus of the Suez Canal, having the same boun ...

. He apparently made several visits to Venice during this time, but his earliest known work depicting that city was in 1872. Many of his Orientalist paintings from this period are unaccounted for. He died while working on a commission in Haarlem. He was buried there and his grave is maintained in perpetuity by a grant from the

Institut de France The (; ) is a French learned society, grouping five , including the Académie Française. It was established in 1795 at the direction of the National Convention. Located on the Quai de Conti in the 6th arrondissement of Paris, the institute m ...

. In 1900, a promenade was named after him in

Fréjus Fréjus (; ) is a commune in the Var department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in Southeastern France. In 2019, it had a population of 54,458. It neighbours Saint-Raphaël, effectively forming one urban agglomeration. The north of ...

; one of his favorite places to paint.

Sources

* ''Edouard Imer'', exhibition catalogue, Association des Artistes, January 1882 * Lynne Thornton, ''Les Orientalistes, peintres voyageurs (1828-1908)'', Art Creation Realisation, 2001 * Marion Vidal-Bué, ''Alger et ses peintres (1830-1960)'', Méditerranée, 2000

External links

More works by Imer
@ ArtNet {{DEFAULTSORT:Imer, Edouard-Auguste 1820 births 1881 deaths 19th-century French painters French landscape painters French orientalists Artists from Avignon