Charles Angrand (; 19 April 1854 – 1 April 1926) was a French artist who gained renown for his Neo-Impressionist paintings and drawings. He was an important member of the Parisian avant-garde art scene in the late 1880s and early 1890s.

Early life and work

Charles Théophile Angrand was born in Criquetot-sur-Ouville,

Normandy Normandy (; or ) is a geographical and cultural region in northwestern Europe, roughly coextensive with the historical Duchy of Normandy. Normandy comprises Normandy (administrative region), mainland Normandy (a part of France) and insular N ...

, France, to schoolmaster Charles P. Angrand (1829–96) and his wife Marie (1833–1905). He received artistic training in

Rouen Rouen (, ; or ) is a city on the River Seine, in northwestern France. It is in the prefecture of Regions of France, region of Normandy (administrative region), Normandy and the Departments of France, department of Seine-Maritime. Formerly one ...

at Académie de Peinture et de Dessin. His first visit to Paris was in 1875, to see a

retrospective A retrospective (from Latin ', "look back"), generally, is a look back at events that took place, or works that were produced, in the past. As a noun, ''retrospective'' has specific meanings in software development, popular culture, and the arts. ...

of the work of

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot ( , , ; 16 July 1796 – 22 February 1875), or simply Camille Corot, was a French Landscape art, landscape and Portraitist, portrait painter as well as a printmaking, printmaker in etching. A pivotal figure in ...

École des Beaux-Arts ; ) refers to a number of influential art schools in France. The term is associated with the Beaux-Arts architecture, Beaux-Arts style in architecture and city planning that thrived in France and other countries during the late nineteenth centu ...

. Corot was an influence on Angrand's early work. After being denied entry into École des Beaux-Arts, he moved to Paris in 1882, where he began teaching mathematics at

Collège Chaptal In France, secondary education is in two stages: * ''Collèges'' () cater for the first four years of secondary education from the ages of 11 to 14. * ''Lycées'' () provide a three-year course of further secondary education for students between ...

. His living quarters were near Café d'Athènes, Café Guerbois,

Le Chat Noir (; French for "The Black Cat") was a 19th century entertainment establishment in the Montmartre district of Paris. It was opened on 18 November 1881 at 84 Boulevard de Rochechouart by impresario Rodolphe Salis, and closed in 1897 not long ...

, and other establishments frequented by artists. Angrand joined the artistic world of the Parisian

avant-garde In the arts and literature, the term ''avant-garde'' ( meaning or ) identifies an experimental genre or work of art, and the artist who created it, which usually is aesthetically innovative, whilst initially being ideologically unacceptable ...

, becoming friends with influential members including

Georges Seurat Georges Pierre Seurat ( , ; ; 2 December 1859 – 29 March 1891) was a French post-Impressionist artist. He devised the painting techniques known as chromoluminarism and pointillism and used conté crayon for drawings on paper with a rough ...

Vincent van Gogh Vincent Willem van Gogh (; 30 March 185329 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist painter who is among the most famous and influential figures in the history of Western art. In just over a decade, he created approximately 2,100 artworks ...

, Paul Signac, Maximilien Luce, and Henri-Edmond Cross. His avant-garde artistic and literary contacts influenced him, and in 1884 he co-founded

Société des Artistes Indépendants The Société des Artistes Indépendants (, ''Society of Independent Artists'') or Salon des Indépendants was formed in Paris on 29 July 1884. The association began with the organization of massive exhibitions in Paris, choosing the slogan "''sa ...

, along with Seurat, Signac,

Odilon Redon Odilon Redon (born Bertrand Redon; ; 20 April 18406 July 1916) was a French Symbolist painting, Symbolist draftsman, printmaker, and painter. Early in his career, both before and after fighting in the Franco-Prussian War, Redon worked almost exc ...

, and others.

Art

Angrand's

Impressionist Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...

paintings of the early 1880s, generally depicting rural subjects and containing broken brushstrokes and light-filled colouration, reflect the influences of

Claude Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, ; ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of Impressionism painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During his ...

Camille Pissarro Jacob Abraham Camille Pissarro ( ; ; 10 July 1830 – 13 November 1903) was a Danish-French Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist painter born on the island of St Thomas (now in the US Virgin Islands, but then in the Danish West Indies). ...

, and Jules Bastien-Lepage. Through his interactions with Seurat, Signac, and others in the mid-1880s, his style evolved towards Neo-Impressionism. From 1887 his paintings were Neo-Impressionist and his drawings incorporated Seurat's tenebrist style. Angrand had the "ability to distil poetry from the most banal suburban scene". In 1887 he met van Gogh, who proposed a painting exchange (which ultimately did not happen). Van Gogh was influenced by Angrand's thick brushstrokes and Japanese-inspired compositional asymmetry. Also in 1887, ''L'Accident'', his first Divisionist painting, was exhibited at the Salon des Indépendants. Angrand joined Seurat in

plein air ''En plein air'' (; French for 'outdoors'), or plein-air painting, is the act of painting outdoors. This method contrasts with studio painting or academic rules that might create a predetermined look. The theory of 'En plein air' painting is c ...

painting on La Grande Jatte island. Angrand's implementation of Pointillist techniques differed from that of some of its leading proponents. He painted with a more muted palette than Seurat and Signac, who used bright contrasting colours. As seen in ''Couple in the street'', Angrand used dots of various colours to enhance shadows and provide the proper tone, while avoiding the violent colouration found in many other Neo-Impressionist works. His monochrome conté crayon drawings such as his self-portrait above, which also demonstrate his delicate handling of light and shadow, were assessed by Signac: "... his drawings are masterpieces. It would be impossible to imagine a better use of white and black ... These are the most beautiful drawings, poems of light, of fine composition and execution." Angrand exhibited his work in Paris at Les Indépendants, Galerie Druet, Galérie

Durand-Ruel Paul Durand-Ruel (; 31 October 1831 – 5 February 1922) was a French art dealer associated with the Impressionism, Impressionists and the Barbizon school, Barbizon School. Being the first to support artists such as Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro, ...

, and Bernheim-Jeune, and also in Rouen. His work appeared in

Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...

in an 1891 show with Les XX. In the early 1890s, he abandoned painting, instead creating conté drawings and

pastel A pastel () is an art medium that consists of powdered pigment and a binder (material), binder. It can exist in a variety of forms, including a stick, a square, a pebble, and a pan of color, among other forms. The pigments used in pastels are ...

s of subjects including rural scenes and depictions of mother and child, realized in dark Symbolist intensity. During this period, he also drew illustrations for

anarchist Anarchism is a political philosophy and Political movement, movement that seeks to abolish all institutions that perpetuate authority, coercion, or Social hierarchy, hierarchy, primarily targeting the state (polity), state and capitalism. A ...

publications such as '' Les Temps nouveaux''; other Neo-Impressionists contributing to these publications included Signac, Luce, and

Théo van Rysselberghe Théophile "Théo" van Rysselberghe (23 November 1862 – 13 December 1926) was a Belgian Neo-impressionism, neo-impressionist Painting, painter, who played a pivotal role in the European art scene at the turn of the twentieth century. Bi ...

Later years

Charles Angrand - The Harvesters - Google Art Project

In 1896 he moved to Saint-Laurent-en-Caux, in Upper Normandy. He began painting again around 1906, emulating the styles and colours of Signac and Cross. Angrand developed his own unique methods of Divisionism, with larger brushstrokes. As this resulted in rougher optical blending than small dots, he compensated by using more intense colours. Some of his landscapes from this period are almost nonrepresentational. Before World War I, he lived for a year in

Dieppe Dieppe (; ; or Old Norse ) is a coastal commune in the Seine-Maritime department, Normandy, northern France. Dieppe is a seaport on the English Channel at the mouth of the river Arques. A regular ferry service runs to Newhaven in England ...

. Then he moved back to Rouen, living there for the rest of his life. He was very reclusive for his last thirty years, but remained a dedicated correspondent. Angrand died in Rouen on 1 April 1926. He is buried in Cimetière monumental de Rouen.

Collections

Angrand's work is in many museum collections, including Ateneum ( Finnish National Gallery),

Cleveland Museum of Art The Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) is an art museum in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. Located in the Wade Park District of University Circle, the museum is internationally renowned for its substantial holdings of Asian art, Asian and Art of anc ...

, Hecht Museum, Indianapolis Museum of Art,

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an Encyclopedic museum, encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the List of largest museums, third-largest museum in the world and the List of larg ...

Musée d'Orsay The Musée d'Orsay ( , , ) () is a museum in Paris, France, on the Rive Gauche, Left Bank of the Seine. It is housed in the former Gare d'Orsay, a Beaux-Arts architecture, Beaux-Arts railway station built from 1898 to 1900. The museum holds mai ...

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston The Museum of Fine Arts (often abbreviated as MFA Boston or MFA) is an art museum in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the list of largest art museums, 20th-largest art museum in the world, measured by public gallery area. It contains 8,161 painting ...

, and

Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek The Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek ("ny" means "new" in Danish; "Glyptotek" comes from the Greek root ''glyphein'', to carve, and ''theke'', storing place), commonly known simply as Glyptoteket, is an art museum in Copenhagen, Denmark. The collection ...

Influence

In 2010, LAVA The Libertarian, Agorist, Voluntaryist and Anarch Authors and Publishers Association
/ref> created the Charles Angrand (Artwork) Award, which has been awarded annually since 2011. The LAVA Awards are held annually to honor excellence in books relating to the principles of liberty, with the Charles Angrand Award being the grand prize award for artwork.

Gallery

File:Angrand - Le Pont De Pierre.jpg, ''Le Pont De Pierre'',
ca. 1880 File:Charles Angrand, The Guardian of Turkeys.jpg, ''The Guardian of Turkeys'', 1881 File:Charles Angrand, Feeding the chickens.jpg, ''Feeding the Chickens'', 1884 File:Charles Angrand, Path in the Country.jpg, ''Path in the Country'',
ca. 1886 File:Angrand - The Harvest.jpg, ''The Harvest'', 1890 File:Angrand - Little Farm.jpg, ''The Little Farm'', 1890 File:Charles Angrand, The Harvesters.jpg, ''The Harvesters'', 1892 File:Charles Angrand, Farmyard.jpg, ''Farmyard'', 1892 File:Charles Angrand, Le Petit Port.jpg, ''Le Petit Port'' File:Charles Angrand, Hay Ricks in Normandy.jpg, ''Hay Ricks in Normandy'' File:Charles Angrand, Mother and Child.jpg, ''Mother and Child'' File:Charles Angrand, Wheat.jpg, ''Wheat''

References

Sources

* *

External links

''Signac, 1863-1935''
a fully digitized exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art Libraries, which contains material on Charles Angrand (see index) {{DEFAULTSORT:Angrand, Charles French Post-impressionist painters 19th-century French painters French male painters 20th-century French painters 20th-century French male artists Pointillism French Impressionist painters French anarchists Painters from Paris People from Seine-Maritime Artists from Normandy 1854 births 1926 deaths 19th-century French male artists