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for JULES BASTIEN LEPAGE
JULES BASTIEN LEPAGE
1848-1884
(b Damvillers, Meuse, 1 Nov 1848; d Paris, 10 Dec 1884).
French painter. Bastien-Lepage grew up on a farm. In 1868 he left the civil service and was accepted into Alexandre Cabanel's atelier. During this apprenticeship, Bastien-Lepage won two prizes in drawing, and in 1870 he made his début at the Salon with a Portrait of a Young Man (untraced). A pastiche of Watteau was accepted at the Salon in 1873, and two further canvases in 1874-an allegory, Song of Spring (Verdun, Mus. Princerie), and Portrait of my Grandfather (Nice, Mus. B.-A.), the critical success of which launched his career.
For his Prix de Rome entry of 1875, the Annunciation to the Shepherds (Melbourne, N.G. Victoria), he borrowed elements from Ingres and the 17th-century Spanish painter Jusepe de Ribera; although Bastien-Lepage did not win the competition with this work, it was much admired for its skill and erudition.
Bastien-Lepage's next major work was Joan of Arc Listening to the Voices (1879; exh. Salon 1880; New York, Met.; see fig.). The apparitions he painted behind her aroused considerable controversy when the painting was first shown, as this was an unconventional rendering of the theme.
In his last years he remained faithful to peasant themes, inspired by the memories of his childhood. British artists, especially George Clausen and Henry Herbert La Thangue, Australians such as Tom Roberts and Americans such as Julian Alden Weir were deeply affected by his compositions and complex and varied painting technique.
In his handling of a rich, thick paint texture he owed much to an awareness of earlier Realist painters such as Courbet; he was also influenced by Whistler and possibly John Singer Sargent. Bastien-Lepage's ability to keep certain areas of his canvas free from reworking also reflected an awareness of Impressionistic broken brushstroke painting and an immediacy of touch. However, other sections of a work reflected a painstaking exactitude, suggestive of a classical training and an interest in photographic detail. This technique, as well as the subject-matter of his paintings, made him seem compellingly modern when his work was shown at Salons in Paris and exhibitions in London.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
J. A. Weir: 'Jules Bastien-Lepage', Modern French Masters, ed. J. C. Van Dyke (New York, 1896/R 1976)
W. Feldman: The Life and Work of Jules Bastien-Lepage (1848-1884) (diss., New York U., 1973)
K. McConkey: 'The Bouguereau of the Naturalists: Bastien-Lepage and British Art', A. Hist., i (1978), pp. 371-82
The Realist Tradition: French Painting and Drawing, 1830-1900 (exh. cat., ed. G. P. Weisberg; Cleveland, OH, Mus. A., 1980)
K. McConkey: 'Listening to the Voices: A Study of Some Aspects of Jules Bastien-Lepage's Joan of Arc Listening to the Voices', A. Mag., lvi (Jan 1982), pp. 154-60
G. P. Weisberg: 'Jules Breton, Jules Bastien-Lepage and Camille Pissarro in the Context of Nineteenth-century Peasant Painting and the Salon', A. Mag., lvi (Feb 1982), pp. 115-19
W. Feldman: 'Jules Bastien-Lepage: A New Perspective', A. Bull. Victoria, xxiv (1983), pp. 2-10
K. McConkey: 'A la moderne: A Study of Jules Bastien-Lepage's Au Printemps', A. Mag., lvii (Jan 1983), pp. 107-9
Jules Bastien-Lepage (exh. cat., preface, P. Pagnotta; Verdun, Mus. Princerie, 1984)
M. Aubrun: Jules Bastien-Lepage (Paris, 1985) [cat. rais.]
G. P. Weisberg: Beyond Impressionism: The Natural Impulse (New York, 1992)
GABRIEL P. WEISBERG
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