François-Louis Français (1814–1897), also known as Louis Français, was a French painter, lithographer and illustrator who became one of the most commercially successful landscape painters of the 19th century. A former pupil of Gigoux, he began his career by studying lithography and wood engraving, becoming a prolific illustrator and print-maker. His work as an illustrator is to be found in around forty books and numerous magazines from the late 1830s to the 1860s. Français also produced a large number of pen and ink drawings, enhanced by sepia, notable for their attention to detail and for their technical adroitness and conciseness.Laurence Pauchet-Warlop, Jane Turner (editor) (2000), ''The Grove Dictionary of Art, From Monet to Cézanne, Late 19th-century French Artists'', Oxford University Press, New York, Français is associated with the Barbizon School of painting, a movement to represent art in nature in a

Romantic Romantic may refer to: Genres and eras * The Romantic era, an artistic, literary, musical and intellectual movement of the 18th and 19th centuries ** Romantic music, of that era ** Romantic poetry, of that era ** Romanticism in science, of that e ...

, Realist context. In 1836 whilst at Barbizon he met the landscape painter

Camille Corot Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot ( , , ; July 16, 1796 – February 22, 1875), or simply Camille Corot, is a French landscape and portrait painter as well as a printmaker in etching. He is a pivotal figure in landscape painting and his vast o ...

and began a ten-year association as a friend and acolyte. Français's paintings possess some of the prominent features of the work of Corot in his use of tonal colours, loose brushwork and an emphasis on softness of form. Français exhibited first at the

Paris Salon The Salon (french: Salon), or rarely Paris Salon (French: ''Salon de Paris'' ), beginning in 1667 was the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Between 1748 and 1890 it was arguably the greatest annual or biennial art ...

in 1837 and regularly thereafter until his death in 1897. He lived from 1846 to 1849 in Italy, where he experimented with a brighter palette. His work developed neo-classical sentiments with mythical creatures appearing within a realist landscape. Whilst this bought him commercial success it alienated some critics who were harsh in their judgement of his work. A well respected and decorated artist within France, he was also internationally well known during his lifetime exhibiting abroad in Geneva and London but following his death in 1897, his reputation declined and there are relatively few of his paintings on show in public galleries beyond France.

Early years

François-Louis Français was born in

Plombières-les-Bains Plombières-les-Bains () is a commune in the Vosges department in Grand Est in eastern France. It was the seat of the former canton of Plombières-les-Bains. ''Les bains'' refers to the hot springs in the area, whose properties were first di ...

in the Vosges region on 17 November 1814. He was the son of Jean Français, a

mercer Mercer may refer to: Business * Mercer (car), a defunct American automobile manufacturer (1909–1925) * Mercer (consulting firm), a large human resources consulting firm headquartered in New York City * Mercer (occupation), a merchant or trader ...

and Marie-Anne Français (née Vançon). He showed aptitude in drawing from an early age and attended classes in Plombières. His family wished to encourage him and in 1829 found him a job in a bookshop in Paris where he could build up contacts with a view to becoming an illustrator. Initially he worked as a copyist, produced caricatures and drew models at the Académie Suisse. In 1831 he began studying painting and his first known landscapes are from this period . It was a period of struggle during which he made a precarious living mainly by drawing on stone and designing woodcut vignettes for book illustration. The publishing firm of Paulin employed him and in 1833 offered Français the opportunity to illustrate some of the ornate letters in

Alain-René Lesage Alain-René Lesage (; 6 May 166817 November 1747; older spelling Le Sage) was a French novelist and playwright. Lesage is best known for his comic novel '' The Devil upon Two Sticks'' (1707, ''Le Diable boiteux''), his comedy ''Turcaret'' (170 ...

's ''Histoire de Gil Blas de Santillane'' published in January 1835. The main illustrator of Lesage's work was

Jean Gigoux Jean François Gigoux (6 January 1806, Besançon – 11 December 1894, Paris) was a French painter, lithographer, illustrator and art collector. Biography His father, Claude Étienne Gigoux, was a blacksmith, originally from Seveux (Haute-Saô ...

, an eminent painter and illustrator and impressed by Français' potential he invited him to work at his Parisian atelier.

Illustrator and print-maker

As an illustrator François-Louis Français had a long career, until 1860, during which he drew vignettes for numerous books and magazines. It was a lucrative occupation and allowed financial security whilst he simultaneously developed his painting techniques. His illustrations for a new edition of

Bernardin Bernardin is both a given name and a surname. Notable people with the name include: Given name: *Bernardin-François Fouquet (1705–1785), French Catholic prelate, Cardinal, abbot and archbishop of Embrun *Bernardin Frankopan (1453–1529), Croat ...

's romantic novel Paul et Virginie in 1835 were recognised as a high watermark of romantic illustration and began a profitable and prolific collaboration with the engraver

Tony Johannot Antoine Johannot, known commonly as Tony Johannot (9 November 1803 – 4 August 1852), was a French engraver, illustrator and painter. Biography He was born in Offenbach am Main. His father, François Johannot (c. 1760–1838), owned a silk fac ...

, the culmination of which was around two hundred vignettes, including around fifty landscapes. He worked with his friends

Henri Baron Henri Charles Antoine Baron (23 June 1816, in Besançon – 11 September 1885, in Geneva) was a French genre painter, engraver and illustrator. Biography He studied art with Jean Gigoux, who heavily influenced his work. His debut at the Salon ...

and

Célestin Nanteuil Célestin-François Nanteuil-Lebœuf, known as Célestin Nanteuil, (11 July 1813 – 6 September 1873) was a French painter, engraver and illustrator closely tied to the Romantic movement in France. He was born in Rome of French parents who wer ...

on illustrations for ''Les Artistes anciens et modernes''. Together they founded the revue ''Les artistes contemporains'' and worked in collaboration on numerous engravings for the publishing firm Bertauts, often using the monogram B.N.F. to identify their ownership. A noteworthy commission were the illustrations in L'abbé

Jean-Jacques Bourassé Jean-Jacques Bourassé (22 December 1813, Ste.-Maure (Indre-et-Loire), France—4 October 1872, Tours) was a French Roman Catholic priest, archaeologist and historian. He made his preparatory studies for the priesthood in Paris. In 1835, he tau ...

's ''La Touraine. Histoire et monuments'' where Français provided forty wood engravings, five engraved plates and eleven beautiful ornate letters, for which he and his collaborator

Karl Girardet Karl Girardet (born Charles Girardet; 7 May 1813, in Le Locle – 24 April 1871, in Versailles) was a Swiss painter and illustrator, who lived and worked mostly in Paris. After beginning his career as a landscape painter, he became a renowned his ...

, earned a gold medal at the Exposition Universelle in 1855. Amongst the many prints that he supervised were those done after Corot's landscape, ''Sunset'' (1840), Diaz's ''Bathers'' (1847) and several of his own paintings. Many prints were reused, for example, ''Un Chemin (A Road)'' was first published in Paris by Augustin Challamel for the

Paris salon The Salon (french: Salon), or rarely Paris Salon (French: ''Salon de Paris'' ), beginning in 1667 was the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Between 1748 and 1890 it was arguably the greatest annual or biennial art ...

of 1842. Ten years later a second state was published by Marchant for the series, ''Les Peintres vivants'' .

Painting career

In 1834 Français went to live at Barbizon and painted in the nearby Forest of Fontainbleu. He was part of the Barbizon school of artists dedicated to painting directly from nature, often en plein air, who settled in the area around the Auberge Ganne Inn. In a radical departure from formalism in art, nature itself became the subject of the painting. as many artists met at the Inn to discuss ideas and to set forth to paint in the Forest. Français met and befriended fellow artist Louis Cabat and in 1836 he became acquainted with

, eighteen years older than Français and with whom he formed a strong personal bond of friendship and as a personal adviser, who was willing to offer technical advice and to introduce Français to some influential people. Under Corot's influence Français developed a style of landscape painting using tonal colours to express light that are reminiscent of Corot. Français was never able to capture Corot's delicacy at depicting the human form but he developed exponentially into a fine landscape painter, albeit one that maintained an element of formalism. This formality was not surprising from a student of Gigoux but Français is known to have studied and admired the work of the early baroque painter

Claude Lorrain Claude Lorrain (; born Claude Gellée , called ''le Lorrain'' in French; traditionally just Claude in English; c. 1600 – 23 November 1682) was a French painter, draughtsman and etcher of the Baroque era. He spent most of his life in It ...

’s work at

The Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...

. The occasional use of neo-classical subjects and the placing of mythological figures within the landscape that Français sometimes adopted bear a resemblance to the oeuvre of Lorrain. Français François-Louis - Les Hêtres de la côte de Grâce près de Honfleur (1859)

Français François-Louis - Les Hêtres de la côte de Grâce près de Honfleur (1859)

In 1837 Français exhibited at the Salon for the first time, presenting ''Sous les saules (Under the Willows) (1837: Tours museum)'', a painting where the figures are by

. The exhibition catalogue listed 2,130 entries but Français' painting was noticed and commented upon favourably. In the mid-1840s, Français travelled regularly with Baron and their friend Nanteuil, to Bougival, a village on the Seine increasingly famous for its scenery and light changes.In the mid-19th century, Bougival was connected by the railway and quickly emerged as a fashionable suburb of Paris, where artists and writers who included Turgenev, who died in Bougival in 1883 lived and worked. Artists including Renoir, Monet, Morisot and Sisley painted in the area which has since become known as the ''Cradle of Impressionism''. The paintings from this period, several of which were transposed to lithographs, are often signed ''Français, Elèves de Bougival (Student of Bougival)''. ''Soleil couchant'' (1845, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon), an autumnal landscape of the river at Bougival, was presented at the 1845 Salon of

Charles Baudelaire Charles Pierre Baudelaire (, ; ; 9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poetry, French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist and art critic. His poems exhibit mastery in the handling of rhyme and rhythm, contain an exoticis ...

, one of three that the poet organised. Baudelaire praised the canvas, as an example, of how to capture the poetic realism of nature. In 1846 Français travelled to Italy for the first time staying in various locations: Rome (1846/9), Genoa (1846),

Pisa Pisa ( , or ) is a city and ''comune'' in Tuscany, central Italy, straddling the Arno just before it empties into the Ligurian Sea. It is the capital city of the Province of Pisa. Although Pisa is known worldwide for its leaning tower, the cit ...

(1846), Florence (1846/7), Frascati (1847), Ariccia (1848) and

Tivoli Tivoli may refer to: * Tivoli, Lazio, a town in Lazio, Italy, known for historic sites; the inspiration for other places named Tivoli Buildings * Tivoli (Baltimore, Maryland), a mansion built about 1855 * Tivoli Building (Cheyenne, Wyoming), a ...

(1848/49). This extended sojourn enabled Français to develop his style. His palette became more luminous and he began to paint in the closely set strokes that would be a feature of his later work. He acquired a passion for painting the light and would return to Italy throughout his career. He accumulated numerous drawings, sketches and watercolours often in gouache which enabled him to execute some of his best known canvases from the period that included ''Fontaine à Ariccia (Fountain at Ariccia) (1848, Paris Mus d ‘Orsay)''. Returning to France he travelled and painted extensively throughout France in the 1850s. He regularly visited Plombières and the Loire valley, where he favoured realistic forest landscapes and riverbanks scenes. Français was often in the company of other artists during these visits and with Corot, Courbet,

Jongkind Johan Barthold Jongkind (3 June 1819 – 9 February 1891) was a Dutch painter and printmaker. He painted marine landscapes in a free manner and is regarded as a forerunner of Impressionism. Biography Jongkind was born in the town of Lattro ...

and the locally born Boudin, he was part of ''école de Honfleur'' (''Honfleur school'') that was drawn to paint the light and landscapes around

Honfleur Honfleur () is a commune in the Calvados department in northwestern France. It is located on the southern bank of the estuary of the Seine across from le Havre and very close to the exit of the Pont de Normandie. The people that inhabit Honf ...

in Normandy. The images created during this interlude, by Français and his fellow artists, later inspired Jongkind and Claude Monet to open the Impressionist School of St. Simeon at Honfleur in 1862. ''Les Hêtres de la côte de Grâce près de Honfleur (1859)'' is a fine example of his work in Normandy in the 1850s. It features a weathered tree distorted by the coastal winds that buffet the coast. As always with Français there is precision in the detail. Much of the painting features a forbidding sky that pays debt to Français' knowledge of

Constable A constable is a person holding a particular office, most commonly in criminal law enforcement. The office of constable can vary significantly in different jurisdictions. A constable is commonly the rank of an officer within the police. Other peop ...

Career after 1860

Français was a successful painter by the 1860s. He had a regular income, not least from his patron the Alsatian industrialist Alfred Hartmann, the younger brother of Frédéric Hartmann,

Théodore Rousseau Étienne Pierre Théodore Rousseau (April 15, 1812December 22, 1867) was a French painter of the Barbizon school. Life Youth He was born in Paris, France in a bourgeois family. At first he received a basic level of training, but soon displaye ...

’s long-suffering and most important patron of the Second Empire. His paintings were invariably accepted at the Parisian salons. They were not always well received by some critics. His painting, ''Bois sacré'', ''(Sacred wood) (1864)'', now at the Lille, Palais des Beaux-Arts was heavily criticised, as not up to standard by some observers, who objected to the admittedly dominant, mythical figures at the centre of a realist canvas. His patron Hartmann didn’t like it either, as he made clear in a letter to Rousseau. ''Le Bois sacré'' was one of a series of popular realism landscapes containing neo-classical themes that Français produced in the 1860s, often from sketches made following an Italian visit such as that to Naples in 1859 and to

Pompeii Pompeii (, ) was an ancient city located in what is now the ''comune'' of Pompei near Naples in the Campania region of Italy. Pompeii, along with Herculaneum and many villas in the surrounding area (e.g. at Boscoreale, Stabiae), was buried ...

in 1864-5. He continued to travel extensively throughout his life and in common with many well-off French people would spend his winters in warmer southern climes, after 1873 in Nice, often with his companion Rose Maireau, an engraver who exhibited her work at Petit Palais shortly after it opened in 1900. In 1878, after six years of intermittent work he completed a series of decorative panels for the font of the new Second Empire church of Sainte-Trinité, Paris The avowed socialism of Français’ youth had receded to that of patriarch of the Third Republic. Also in 1878 ''Le Mont Cervin et Le Lac de Némi (The Matterhorn and the Lake of Némi)'' was awarded the Médaille d'honneur at the Paris Salon. A year after in 1879 Français was a founding member of the ''

Société d'aquarellistes français The Société d'aquarellistes français ( en, Society of French Watercolourists), often in uncontracted form as Société des aquarellistes français, was an association of painters in watercolour in nineteenth-century France. It held annual ex ...

'' (Society of French Watercolourists), the aim of which was to exhibit the watercolour paintings of the members, initially limited to just forty. The Society ceased in 1896. At the 1884 Salon, he exhibited ''L'Étang de Clisson (Forest of Clisson)'' following a visit to the Loire valley. An evocation of the upper Loire, the preparatory drawings for which are at the Metropolitan Museum, the finished canvas has a freshness and a poetic naturalism reminiscent of Français’ work in the 1850s. One of his most successful later paintings is ''Vue d'Antibes'' (1894) where he returned with some effect to the landscapes and skies of Corot and Millet. Français entered his final decade as a man with a considerable artistic reputation. In 1890 he was the first landscape artist to be elected to the Chair of the

Académie Française An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary education, secondary or tertiary education, tertiary higher education, higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membershi ...

, the same year he won the Médaille d'honneur at the Société des Artistes Français where he exhibited two landscapes. He had international recognition which eluded many French artists. He exhibited at Geneva in 1857, 1858 and 1861 and in London in 1862 and 1874. Following his death a rather grand memorial was erected to his memory at Plombières-les-Bains. His former studio in Plombières is now the Musée Louis Français François-Louis Français died in Plombières on 18 May 1897.H. Chisholm, ed. (1911). "Français, François Louis". Encyclopædia Britannica. 10 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 774.

Notes

Bibliography

* Aimee Gros (Paris, 1902): ''François-Louis Français :Causeries et souvenirs par un de ses élèves'' * Tradition and Revolution in French Art 1700 -1880: Painting and Drawings from Lille (exh.cat., London, National Gallery. 1993) * François-Louis Français, Plombières-les-Bains, 1814-1897 : Illustrateur romantique (exh.cat., by R.Conilleau) * Aquarelles, dessins et gravures de François-Louis Français (exh.cat, Région Lorraine, 1982–3) * P. Miquel (1975), ''Le Paysage Français ay XIXe siècle 1824 – 1874 : L’Ecole de la Nature'', iii (Maurs-la-Jolie), pages 608-645 * H. Chisholm, ed. (1911). "Français, François Louis". Encyclopædia Britannica. 10 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 774. * Laurence Pauchet-Warlop, Jane Turner (editor) (2000), The Grove Dictionary of Art, From Monet to Cézanne, Late 19th-century French Artists, p. 179–181, Oxford University Press, New York, * K.S. Champa, (1991). The Rise of Landscape Painting in France: Corot to Monet. Harry N. Abrams, Inc., * Janine Bailly-Herzberg, (1985) Dictionnaire de l’Estampe en France, 1830-1950. Coll. « Arts et Métiers Graphiques », Paris, Flammarion, * François-Louis Français, Henri Baron and Célestin Nanteuil : ''Les Artistes anciens et modernes'', 3 vols (Paris 1848–62)

References

Gallery (selected)

File:François-Louis Français (1814-1897), Le Vieux Vagabond (The Old Vagabond), illustration from The Complete Works of Béranger (1829).jpg, ''Le Vieux Vagabond'', illustration from The Complete Works of Béranger (1829).jpg File:A group of people adrift in a boat, perhaps suffering from malaria Wellcome L0012191.jpg, Lithograph by Français after A.E. Hébert, (1850) File:Ruines de l'abbaye de Sylvacane.jpg, ''Ruines de l'abbaye de Sylvacane (Ruins of Silvacane abbey)'' after Auguste de Forbin, (pub 1859) File:François-Louis Français (1814 - 1897), Souvenir de Tivoli (1849), oil painting, 160 x 65 cm.jpg, ''Souvenir de Tivoli'' (1849) File:Seated Figure by a Lake MET DP821244.jpg, ''Personnage assis près d'un lac'', File:Louis Français-Cascade du Gehard (Vosges).jpg, ''Cascade du Gehard (Vosges)'' File:François-Louis Français (1814 - 1897), Dimineață la Barbizon, oil on plywood, 26 x 37 cm.jpg, ''Dimineață la Barbizon (In the morning at Barbizon)'' (c 1850) File:François-Louis Français Au bord de l'eau, environs de Paris (1861), Nantes Musée d'Arts.jpg, ''Au bord de l'eau, environs de Paris'' (''By the water's edge, near Paris)'' (1861). File:François-Louis Français (1814 – 1897), Musique Champetre (1863), oil painting, 54.6 x 65.5 cm.jpg, ''Musique Champetre (1863)'' File:François-Louis Français (1814 - 1897) , Mountain Stream, (c.1865), National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C. watercolor and gouache on textured wove paper.jpg, Mountain Stream, watercolour (c1865). File:François Louis Français - Sunset - 37.598 - Museum of Fine Arts.jpg, ''Sunset (1878)'' File:The ruins of Saint Cloud in 1871 by François Louis Français.jpg, ''The ruins of Saint Cloud'' (1871) File:François-Louis Français - View of the Château of Pierrefonds - 2008.380 - Cleveland Museum of Art.tif, View of the Château of Pierrefonds (c 1870) File:Louis Français-Crépuscule.jpg, ''Crépuscule'' File:Lille PdBA francais etude bois sacre.jpg, Drawing for ''le Bois-sacré'' File:Illustrated catalogue of paintings, pastels and water colors collected by the late David C. Lyall of Brooklyn (1903) (14593853457).jpg, Environs de Plombières (1903) File:François-Louis Français, A Stream through a Dense Forest, 1884, NGA 152293.jpg, ''Un ruisseau à travers une forêt dense'' (1884) watercolour. File:Forest at Clisson MET DP833951.jpg, ''Forêt à Clisson'' (1890) File:Louis Français-Plombières en hiver 1890.jpg, Plombières in Winter (1890) File:Lille PdBA francais vue frascati.jpg, ''Vue prise à Frascati'' File:François-Louis Français (1814 - 1897 ) Excavations at Pompeii, watercolour c 1886 31cm x 42cm.jpg, ''Excavations at Pompeii'', watercolour (1886). File:Paris 9 - Eglise de la Sainte-Trinité - Baptistère -2.jpg, Church of la Sainte-Trinité, Paris - Baptistère (font) : ''Adam et Ève chassés du Paradis'' ''(Adam and Eve banished from Paradise)'' File:Portrait of François-Louis Français by Carolus-Duran (1888).jpg, Portrait by

Carolus-Duran Charles Auguste Émile Durand, known as Carolus-Duran (Lille 4 July 1837 – 17 February 1917 Paris), was a French painter and art instructor. He is noted for his stylish depictions of members of high society in Third Republic France. Biograph ...

(1888) File:Plombières-Monument Louis Français (4).jpg, Monument in bronze at Plombières-les-Bains (Vosges) by

Émile Peynot Émile Edmond Jean Peynot (November 22, 1850 – December 12, 1932) was a prominent French artist sculptor and Medalist, medallist. Bio Peynot was born in Villeneuve-sur-Yonne, Burgundy. He became well known following his Grand Prize at the P ...

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Francais, Francois Louis 1814 births 1897 deaths 19th-century French painters French male painters French Realist painters Landscape artists French printmakers Officiers of the Légion d'honneur Members of the Académie des beaux-arts