Fauvism
THE EMANCIPATION OF COLOR
Wild beasts! The artists of the Fauvist movement were crazy about color. Their paintings were passionate and vibrant, reflecting their belief that painting should capture pure emotion. Their expressive images were so wild that they shocked the public and became the laughing stock of Paris ... and then, they transformed art as the world knew it.
WHEN & WHERE
c. 1905–1908
Paris, France
Led by Henri Matisse and André Derain, the Fauves were a loose collective of painters united by a love of expressive brushwork and the unbridled use of color that pushed beyond mere description. They were inspired by van Gogh’s violent colors in his paintings, Gauguin and Cézanne’s distortion and simplification of forms, and the sophisticated simplicity of African masks and statuary. The Fauves updated traditional themes by painting them in a non-naturalistic way.
Although short-lived, Fauvism was the first major Avant-Garde art movement of the 20th century and left an indelible mark on modern art. By 1908 the movement as a whole had fizzled out and many of the artists defected to the Cubist ranks. Only Matisse continued to paint in the Fauvist style, leaving the most enduring legacy with his harmonious images full of decorative, flat expanses of color depicting utopian images of figures in nature.
Whether it is in images of cityscapes or nudes frolicking in a forest, the Fauves had a joie de vivre aesthetic that transcends time. —ARR
Selected artists: Georges Braque, Andre Derain, Raoul Dufy, Henri Matisse, Georges Rouault, Kees van Dongen, Maurice de Vlaminck