Adolphe Valette on:
[Wikipedia]
[Google]
[Amazon]
Pierre Adolphe Valette (13 October 1876 – 18 April 1942) was a French
"Exhibition for 'Monet of Manchester' who inspired Lowry"
''The Guardian'', 14 October 2011
Salford painter L. S. Lowry became a pupil of Valette, and expressed great admiration for his tutor, who taught him new techniques and showed him the potential of the urban landscape as a subject. He called him "a real teacher ... a dedicated teacher" and added: "I cannot over-estimate the effect on me of the coming into this drab city of Adolphe Valette, full of French impressionists, aware of everything that was going on in Paris."
In 1920 Valette resigned from the Institute owing to ill health. He stayed in Lancashire for eight more years, teaching privately and painting in Manchester and Bolton. In 1928 he returned to Paris, and subsequently moved to Blacé en Beaujolais where he died in 1942.
Valette's paintings are
File:Albert Square Manchester 1910, Valette.jpg, Albert Square
File:Adolphe Valette India House Manchester.jpg, India House
File:Oxford Road, Manchester 1910, Valette.jpg, Oxford Road. The
ArtNet: More works by Valette.
Geneawiki
page on Adolphe Valette {{DEFAULTSORT:Valette, Pierre Adolphe 1876 births 1942 deaths Alumni of Birkbeck, University of London 19th-century French painters French male painters 20th-century French painters 20th-century French male artists French Impressionist painters French landscape painters 19th-century French male artists
Impressionist
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...
painter who spent most of his career in England. His most acclaimed paintings are urban landscapes of Manchester
Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...
, now in the collection of Manchester Art Gallery
Manchester Art Gallery, formerly Manchester City Art Gallery, is a publicly owned art museum on Mosley Street in Manchester city centre. The main gallery premises were built for a learned society in 1823 and today its collection occupies three c ...
. Today, he is chiefly remembered as L. S. Lowry's tutor.Mark Brow"Exhibition for 'Monet of Manchester' who inspired Lowry"
''The Guardian'', 14 October 2011
Life and career
Born inSaint-Étienne
Saint-Étienne (; frp, Sant-Etiève; oc, Sant Estève, ) is a city and the prefecture of the Loire department in eastern-central France, in the Massif Central, southwest of Lyon in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region.
Saint-Étienne is the t ...
in eastern central France, on 13 October 1876, he trained at the Ecole Municipale de Beaux-Arts et des Arts Decoratifs in Bordeaux
Bordeaux ( , ; Gascon oc, Bordèu ; eu, Bordele; it, Bordò; es, Burdeos) is a port city on the river Garonne in the Gironde department, Southwestern France. It is the capital of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, as well as the prefectur ...
. Valette arrived in England for unknown reasons in 1904 and studied at the Birkbeck Institute
, mottoeng = Advice comes over nightTranslation used by Birkbeck.
, established =
, type = Public research university
, endowment = £4.3 m (2014)
, budget = £109 ...
, now part of the University of London. In 1905 he travelled to the North West of England where he designed greetings cards and calendars for a Manchester printing company. He attended evening classes at Manchester Municipal School of Art and in 1907 he was invited to join the staff as a teacher.
Salford painter L. S. Lowry became a pupil of Valette, and expressed great admiration for his tutor, who taught him new techniques and showed him the potential of the urban landscape as a subject. He called him "a real teacher ... a dedicated teacher" and added: "I cannot over-estimate the effect on me of the coming into this drab city of Adolphe Valette, full of French impressionists, aware of everything that was going on in Paris."
In 1920 Valette resigned from the Institute owing to ill health. He stayed in Lancashire for eight more years, teaching privately and painting in Manchester and Bolton. In 1928 he returned to Paris, and subsequently moved to Blacé en Beaujolais where he died in 1942.
Valette's paintings are Impressionist
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...
. Manchester Art Gallery has a room devoted to him, where the viewer may compare some of his paintings with some of Lowry's, and judge to what extent Lowry's own style was influenced by him and by French Impressionism generally.
The Lowry hosted an exhibition of about 100 works by Valette, alongside works by Lowry, between October 2011 and January 2012. It included paintings of Manchester from Manchester Art Gallery and loans from private owners.
Legacy
There is a commemorativeblue plaque
A blue plaque is a permanent sign installed in a public place in the United Kingdom and elsewhere to commemorate a link between that location and a famous person, event, or former building on the site, serving as a historical marker. The term i ...
to Valette, located on the site on Manchester School of Art on Grosvenor Street, in Manchester, inscribed "Adolphe Valette (1876 - 1942) French painter and teacher in the School of Art 1907 - 1920."
Gallery
Refuge Assurance Building
The Kimpton Clocktower Hotel is a historic commercial building, now a hotel, at the corner of Oxford Street and Whitworth Street in Manchester, England. The building was originally constructed in segments from 1891 to 1932 as the Refuge Assurance ...
can be seen under construction.
File:Adolphe Valette York Street leading to Charles Street Manchester.jpg, York Street leading to Charles Street
References
NotesFurther reading
*Celia Lyon, (tr. Paul Ratcliffe), ''Adolphe Valette'', Phillimore & Co Ltd (2006), * Valette and the Post-Impressionists in "The Northern School: A Reappraisal", Martin Regan 2016,External links
ArtNet: More works by Valette.
Geneawiki
page on Adolphe Valette {{DEFAULTSORT:Valette, Pierre Adolphe 1876 births 1942 deaths Alumni of Birkbeck, University of London 19th-century French painters French male painters 20th-century French painters 20th-century French male artists French Impressionist painters French landscape painters 19th-century French male artists