Aristide Maillol
1861-1944
Maillol went to Paris in 1881 and studied at the École des Beaux-Arts under Gérome and Cabanel, from whose studios he was subsequently dismissed. In 1893 he joined the circle of the Nabis and took up painting. He then turned his attention to tapestry, designing in a style derived from the late Gothic. He set up a tapestry studio in Banyuls, where he chose the wool and used natural dyes. A serious eye accident forced him to give up his work, and he turned to sculpture, having previously produced ceramics influenced by Gauguin, whom he had met in Brussels in 1894. He began as a woodcarver and took up modelling in 1900. At Marly-le-Roi he built the studio where he worked for the rest of his life, except for his summer sojourns at Banyuls. Maillol's style was closely allied to Classical Greek treatment of the nude (a little more round in some works, perhaps, a little more naturalistic in others), a direct continuation of the tradition and making no concessions to the distortions of contemporary art. He was also an excellent draughtsman, in pencil, red chalk and crayon and was a fine printmaker, producing many book illustrations in a style which fused Classicism of outline with a Gothic directness. In 1964 a dozen of his sculptures were placed in the Tuileries Gardens, Paris.
Works Available
Femme Accroupie de Dos