"William Bouguereau 1825-1905, is the Classical Painting technique, High
Art Painting in the history of man, Don Jusko."
To fully appreciate the art of Bouguereau one must profess a deep
respect for the discipline of drawing and the craft of traditional
picture-making; one must likewise submit to the mystery of illusion as one
of painting's most characteristic and sublime powers. Bouguereau's vast
repertory of playful and poetic images cannot help but appeal to those who
are fascinated with nature's appearances and with the celebration of human
sentiment frankly and unabashedly expressed.
But it remains to understand, given Bouguereau's in many ways unique
style, exactly what the artist was trying to represent. Although Bouguereau
has been classified by many writers as a Realist painter, because of the
apparent photographic nature of his illusions, the painter otherwise has
little in common with other artists belonging to the Realist movement.
Bouguereau himself regarded his tastes as eclectic, and his work indeed
exhibits characteristics peculiar to Neo-Classicism, Romanticism, and
Impressionism, as well as to Realism. Within these categories, the painter
is perhaps best understood as a Romantic Realist, but one would also be
quite justified in this case in devising an entirely new school of painting
and labeling him the first, the quintessential Photo-Idealist. The
designation is apt in that, although Bouguereau actively collected
photographs and tempered his observations of nature with a keen awareness of
the qualities of light inherent in the photographic image, he almost never
worked from photographs. The rare exceptions are a few portraits, usually of
posthumous subjects, which are readily identifiable as photographic
derivatives as they exhibit an uncharacteristic flatness and pose.
Bouguereau and his fellow academicians practiced a method of painting
that had been developed and refined over the centuries in order to bring to
vivid life-imagined scenes from history, literature, and fantasy. The
process of acquisition of the skills necessary to produce a first-rate
academic painting was a long and laborious one. Forever distrustful of
educational reforms, Bouguereau once wrote:
"Theory has no place.., in an artist's basic education. It is the eye
and the hand that should be exercised during the impressionable years of
youth .... It is always possible to later acquire the accessory knowledge
involved in the production of a work of art, but never - and I want to
stress that point -- never can the will, perseverance, and tenacity of a
mature man make up for insufficient practice. And can there be such anguish
compared to that felt by the artist who sees the realization of his dream
compromised by weak execution?"
The singular goal of traditional art instruction was to endow artists
with the skills essential for the convincing pictorial actualization of
their imagined visions. The croquis, figure drawings, compositional
sketches, color studies, and cartoons were all logical steps in a process
that at the end magically congealed separately studied details into an
impressive, Illusionistic, and unified ensemble. Plein-air studies were also
commonly done as part of the training of most academic painters. The
impressionist landscape painters, deeply stirred as they were by the visual
world, limited themselves to this genre, and succeeded in refining certain
techniques that wonderfully rendered out-of-door effects; these techniques
were later adopted, in some measure, by many studio painters as well.
Although broken color was not an innovation of the Impressionists
(Vermeer was well aware of the principle), some of them took the technique
to its presumed theoretical limit. But they did so at the expense of form
and modeling, which continued to concern academic painters as well as
conservative Impressionists such as Degas and Fantin-Latour.
Even the Realist painter Courbet, who professed disdain for the unseen
worlds of the academicians, painted imagined scenes which he could not
possibly have produced from direct observation; for their realization, he
was perforce obliged to draw upon the traditional methods of the Academy.
The idealizations of Bouguereau's imaginary universe, which have
delighted some critics, have incurred the wrath of others. Although some of
the latter have loudly lamented the over-romanticized image of the French
peasant presented by the painter, few of them have bothered to contemplate
the heroic attention required to sustain such a vision of perfection in a
less than perfect age. Moreover, as Bouguereau's contemporary Emile Bayard
observed:
"It is good to note, in any case, that dirt and rags are not exclusive
to the underprivileged and that indigence is not always clothed the same
way."
A similar charge often leveled at Bouguereau is that his art bears
little or no relationship to the realities of political, industrial, and
urban life in nineteenth-century France. But if Bouguereau's art ignores in
its content the pressing issues of the day, it may very well be because the
artist, though well aware of them, nevertheless prompts us to lift our eyes
from the ground and focus upon the lures of distant Arcadia; when misery is
afoot, to exalt the more pleasant possibilities of la vie champetre is not
artistic falsehood.
If one pronounces Bouguereau to have been out of step with his time,
what must one then conclude about the many, many critics and collectors and
viewers who supported him and others of a similar artistic persuasion? Could
he really have achieved such prominence and financial success by going
against the grain of the "realities" of the nineteenth century? Exactly what
are those realities and exactly what attitude was a visual artist obligated
to take toward them? If the accomplishments of Bouguereau are poorly
understood today, that may have something to do with the shifting of
aesthetic expectations over time. As for Bouguereau's public, it was a
public raised on Raphael, a public that had not yet been conditioned to
prefer abstract ideas to the palpable images that give them utterance, a
public that insisted upon an obvious narrative content and that saw in
Bouguereau someone opposed to the trends it regarded as inimical to art. It
may very well be that a determining factor in Bouguereau's success as a
painter, apart from his talent, was that he allied himself to that sizeable,
conservative, and revisionist element of French Roman Catholicism which,
under the aegis of such men as Louis Veuillot, popular theologian and
publisher of L'Univers, refused to yield to the attacks on traditional
ideals that were current at the time. Be that as it may, other writers have
moved beyond a simplistic view of the question and have forcefully argued
that Bouguereau properly belongs, for better or worse, in the nineteenth
century; Linda Nochlin has noted, for example:
"...The very concept of contemporaneity is a complex one .... One
might, as the great mid-nineteenth-century historian, Hippolyte Taine,
implied, be perfectly justified in saying that the admonition to be of one's
times was unnecessary, since artists and writers, whether they would or not,
were inevitably condemned to being contemporary, unable to escape those
dominating determinants which Taine had divided into milieu, race and
moment. Thus the works of such strivers after eternal verity as lngres,
Bouguereau or Baudry seem inevitably nineteenth century?."
The quality of reverie that is present in so many of Bouguereau's
works shows clearly to what extent the artist's romantic disposition
prevailed in concert with his classical forms. Bouguereau's alchemical
transformations, in which objects, costumes, and the like are removed from
the realm of the familiar and transplanted in a distant, archetypal and
poetic world, continued a practice with a long academic tradition perhaps
most famously articulated by Poussin. Robert Isaacson has observed: "It is
noteworthy that Bouguereau tried in every way to avoid signs of contemporary
life, even in his choice of costume (a timeless 'peasant' dress), setting
the scene in a never-never land of pure beauty."
The craft of picture-making as practiced by Bouguereau basically
followed the principles of academic theory as codified by the
seventeenth-century aesthetician Roger de Piles. The code embodied the
fundamental idea whereby a painting could be judged logically and
objectively by its conformity to ideals established for its divisible parts,
which were determined to be: composition, drawing, color harmony, and
expression. The method Bouguereau used to execute his important paintings
provided ample opportunity for the study and resolution of problems that
might arise in each of these areas.
The separate steps leading to the genesis of a painting were: 1. croquis and tracings; 2. oil sketch and/or grisaille study; 3. highly finished drawings for all the figures in the composition, as
well as drapery studies and foliage studies; 4. detailed studies in oil for heads, hands, animals, etc.; 5. cartoon; and, only then, 6. the finished painting.
Evidently Bouguereau was constantly making croquis or "thumb nail
sketches;" often these preliminary studies were done during meetings at the
Institute or in the evenings after supper. For the most part they were
scribbled from the artist's memory or imagination, others were sketched
directly from nature. These drawings, hitherto unknown to the public,
constitute a very important element of Bouguereau's work. For one thing,
they yield a wealth of information about the artist's method. They also show
in many cases how a particular composition evolved. Executed either in
pencil or ink, they served as a means of determining the grandes lignes, the
important linear flows and arabesques, within the entire composition and
within individual figure groups as well. They were often refined by means of
successive tracings.
The oil sketches, grisailles, and compositional studies in vine
charcoal served as means for determining appropriate color harmonies and for
the "spotting" of lights and darks. Like the croquis, these were usually
executed from imagination and yielded a fairly abstract pattern of colors
and greys upon which the artist would later superimpose his observations
from nature.
The figure drawings represented the first important contact with
nature in the evolution of the work. Among the considerations of the artist
at this point were anatomy, pose, foreshortening, perspective, proportion
and, to some degree, modeling. Although Bouguereau was reputed to have the
best models in Paris, some of them were not always the most cooperative; as
one observer noted:
"Bouguereau's Italian model-women are instructed to bring their infant
offspring, their tiny sisters and brothers, and the progeny of their highly
prolific quarter. Once in the studio, the little human frogs are undressed
and allowed to roll around on the floor, to play, to quarrel, and to wail in
lamentation. They dirty up the room a great deal -- they bring in a great
deal of dirt that they do not make. They are neither savory nor aristocratic
nor angelic. But out of them the artist makes his capital. Sketchbook in
hand, he records their movements as they tumble on the floor; he draws the
curves and turns of their aldermanic bodies, and he counts the creases of
fat on their plump thighs as Audubon counted the scales on the legs of his
hummingbirds."
If a particular figure was to be clothed, Bouguereau would also make
drapery studies by posing a mannequin in place of the model and
experimenting with the folds of cloth until a disposition was found that
enhanced the underlying forms. Sometimes, especially for small or
single-figure paintings, Bouguereau drew the model already draped. Most of
the figure drawings were executed in pencil or charcoal (or a combination of
the two) and were often heightened with white. The support for them is
usually a heavyweight toned paper Of medium grain; such a background allowed
Bouguereau to dispense with the problem of rendering troublesome half-tones
which, in any event, were more easily and accurately realized in the painted
studies.
Some of Bouguereau's comments help us understand the manner in which
he perceived nature and its representation in his art:
"Paint as you see and be accurate in your drawing: the whole secret of
your art is there."
"If you want to draw and model effectively, you have to see all of the
details as well as the whole at the same time."
"One of the more useful tricks for getting the overall feeling of a
painting, is to blink your eyes while looking at the model."
Some of Bouguereau's drawings were rendered with the aid of an optical
device known as the chambre claire. This instrument, by means of prisms,
allowed the tracing of a subject's outlines, as observed by the artist,
directly onto a drawing board. Used as an artist might use a photograph
today, the chambre claire permitted the artist to readily and quickly
reproduce certain details of nature which could be used later in the studio
as details in a painting.
The oil sketches of heads and hands (cat. no. 128), done, like the
figure drawings, from nature were worked to such a degree of finish that
Bouguereau was frequently able to use them for the finished painting without
further recourse to the live model. The execution and the function of these
studies have been described by Leandre Vaillat:
"Bouguereau would draw [these faces] quickly, in a four-hour session;
he would then keep them by his side while working on the figures to which
they belonged in the painting they were part of, and for which he had
composed a well-balanced sketch beforehand.''
Emile Bayard on Bouguereau:
"He sketches broadly with an extraordinarily unerring eye and hand,
completing a "piece" at one sitting, with no retouching, and painting a
life-size figure in eight days at the most.
The ease of Bouguereau's execution was, to some degree, made possible
by the thorough observations and notes contained in the preliminary studies.
"This impeccable painting, in which everything is depicted with the
utmost care, where the slightest detail is lovingly rendered, was not easily
achieved. The material execution was confident and rapid, but the
preparations were lengthy and carefully thought out, each subject being
weighed and looked at every which way with the help of studies, full-size
cartoons, and numerous painted sketches."
When asked by a journalist if he worked quickly, Bouguereau replied:
"That depends. I produce a lot because I work all day long, without
any breaks. It is the only way in fact of achieving good work. Often I find
the desired gestures for my figures immediately; in that case, my painting
is quickly completed. If, on the other hand, things don't go the way I want,
I put the canvas aside for a day or two and wait till I feel better
disposed. I never work on one picture only but have three or four in
progress in my studio; that way, if a model doesn't turn up one day, I don't
have to sit around with my hands in my pockets, I can work on the others.''
Bouguereau's medium is described by Moreau-Vauthier:
"Bouguereau used siccatives in his painting: a first siccative, a kind
of Courtrai, employed by house-painters and known as siccatif soleil; and
then a second, mysterious siccative whose recipe he kept secret. However,
one of his pupils believes it was composed of a mixture of "siccatif de
Haarlem" and essence, plus a little oliesse added in the summer months to
prevent its drying too quickly. As with most painters, Bouguereau changed
methods several times. One of his students wrote me: "Bouguereau, at the
time I entered his studio, used as his sole medium a liquid composed of
Courtrai mixed with nut oil and turpentine oil in varying proportions,
depending on the colors used. Thus, for shadows, [he used] spirit and
Courtrai, with little or no white; for the other colors, oil, spirit, and a
small amount of Courtrai; finally, to rework a dry outline, pure or nearly
pure oil or spirit. He oiled out the area to be re-painted to desemboire
[that is, to treat the canvas so as to prevent the color from sinking in]
it, with either the first or the second liquid, depending on the effect he
wanted. He also painted with picture-varnish blended into these two liquids,
but that was before I entered his atelier .... "
Bouguereau used "siccatif soleil" in order to lay in his sketch
without thickening it. Sometimes he left it to dry before re-working; other
times, he repainted over it immediately, using a second, less powerful
siccative [the secret one]. In the case of a dry sketch, he rubbed this same
siccative in before re-working. He has also painted with picture-varnish. In
short, he painted with a medium that dried right under the brush."
The "secret recipes" described by Moreau-Vauthier conform closely to
several found in Bouguereau's sketchbooks; they are as follows:
1864 [Sketchbook No. 22]
Quantities for the paste:
Siccative of Haarlem, 6 drops, Diluted with turpentine Oil 2-3 drops
oil, as needed. Courtrai, 1 drop. Add some Haarlem to the white and one drop
of Courtrai to the other colors.
Glazing:
Oil and spirit, little Haarlem. For an extra glaze, little or no
turpentine.
1879 [Sketchbook No. 1]
To prime the canvas before painting:
Haarlem, picture-varnish diluted with elemi (little elemi, 1/5), a
drop or two brown fixed oil and terebine. Afterwards paint with the same
mixture diluted with a few more drops of fixed oil and terebine ..
Other dipper:
picture-varnish and elemi in small quantity and light fixed oil
diluted with turpentine. For a fresh glazing, add to the 2nd dipper a few
drops petroleum spirit.
1894 [Sketchbook No. 2]
To prime the canvas before painting:
Haarlem, picture-varnish diluted with a little elemi at 1/5, one or
two drops fixed oil and terebine.
1st dipper: for painting, same mixture plus a few more drops fixed oil
and terebine.
2nd dipper: picture-varnish and elemi in small quantity and light
fixed oil diluted with turpentine.
3rd dipper: for a fresh glazing, add to second dipper a few drops
petroleum spirit.
1894 [Sketchbook No. 2]
Under painting. Copal dissolved in turpentine diluted with elemi
(little).
Ist dipper, for painting: White siccative. Oliesse and elemi.
Venetian-type painting 1) grind pigments into turpentine; 2) add part of the oliesse and grind again; 3) at the last minute, add the Robertson paste [a commercially prepared
medium] and give a final grinding. Very good for all lacquers.
Bouguereau never mentions a specific palette, but Moreau-Vauthier is
again helpful in this regard; he gives it as: Naples Yellow (lead antimonate) Yellow-Ochre Chrome Yellow, dark Viridian Cobalt Blue White Lead Light Vermilion Chinese Vermilion Mars Brown (iron oxide); this available from Lefranc & Bourgeois Van Dyck
Brown Burnt Sienna Ivory Black Bitumen Genuine Rose Madder, dark
All of Bouguereau's colors are still available today as prepared
artist's paints, but not from any single manufacturer. In one of his
sketchbooks, Bouguereau lists so many pigments that no palette could
possibly contain them, but it is interesting to note all the possibilities
he had to choose from.
1869 [Sketchbook No. 5]
Manganese oil -- Leclerc, rue St. Georges... White lead, (Silver White) Lead carbonate Ivory Black, Charred Ivory Minium, Red Lead Vermilion, Mercuric sulphide Brown Madder, Iron (charred) Cassius Red, Tin bioxide and gold protoxide Iodine Scarlet, (English)Mercuric iodine Purple Red, Mercuric chromate Madder Lake, Mineral Yellow, (Paris) Oxi-chloride of lead Charred Massicot, Lead bioxide and protoxide Minium, orange, Charred ceruse (lead) Chrome, Lead Chromate Orpiment, (King's Yellow) Arsenic sulphide or Yellow sulphide of arsenic Naples Yellow, Lead oxide and antimonate Ochre, Hydrated ferric oxide Indian Yellow, [?](It was a secret of W/N back than. The principal
constituent of Indian yellow is a mixture of the calciun and magnesium salts
of euxanthic acid.) Prussian Blue, Iron protoxide sulphate and prussiate solution Mineral Blue, Iron and [?] Ultramarine Blue, Lapis Lazuli Cobalt, Cobalt smalt, Powdered cobalt glass Ash Blue, Copper Indigo, Vegetable Violet, Charred iron peroxide Cassius, purple and alumina Verdigris, Copper acetate Scheele Green, Copper arsenate Mountain Green, Copper carbonate Chrome Blue, Chromium protoxide Cobalt Blue, (mineral) Cobalt and zinc Viridian, Sulfate of lime and copper aceto-arsenite Green Earth, silica, iron oxide, potassium, magnesia carbonate and water Sap Green, Unripe buckthom berries (lake) Cassel Earth, Cologne Earth, Natural earth darkened mostly with bitumen Umber, Natural earth colored with ferric oxide, manganese dioxide plus a
little bitumen Sienna, Ochreous natural earth and manganese(bioxide ?)hydrate Prussian Brown, Charred Prussian Blue Asphaltum, Bitumen Mummy, Asphaltum and bone ash Yellow Lake, Albumen colored with Avignon yellow grains Cadmium, Cadmium sulfide Azure or smalt, powdered cobalt glass
It seems that Bouguereau purchased prepared colors in tubes, but on
occasion he also ground certain colors himself. It is not known precisely
which brand(s) of prepared colors Bouguereau used, but he did write an
endorsement for the colors of Lefranc: "I am pleased to have only good to
say about the colors made by Messieurs Lefranc et Cie.''
It is surprising to see bitumen included among the colors on
Bouguereau's palette, in that hardly any of his canvases exhibit the ravages
that have afflicted the works of that substance's less prudent users.
Bouguereau made the observation:
"Spirit of bitumen can be purchased on the rue de Buci, across from
No. 14; it can be applied as is on the canvas and, for painting, mixed with
Lefranc bitumen."
Moreau-Vauthier has written:
"I heard Bouguereau say that bitumen is safe if used only for
superficial retouching and not in depth, for under painting." "Bouguereau
resorted to bitumen for retouching, binding, and blending; he glazed with
spirit of bitumen in scumbles and reworked the area in the glaze before the
bitumen was dry .... To convince people of the sturdiness of bitumen,
Bouguereau used to repeat: "They make sidewalks with it."
Bouguereau purchased his materials from many different sources but the
most important were: Deforge et Carpentier -- 8 blvd. Montmartre Hardy-Alan -- 1 rue Childebert, until 1868; later, 56 rue du Cherche-Midi
Jordaney- 7 rue Brea L'Aube (successors to Jordaney) -- 7 rue Brea
When painting, Bouguereau almost always made last minute changes,
despite the extensive preliminaries and the fact that his original drawing
was unalterably inked upon the ground. If one looks closely at The Education
of Bacchus (cat. no. 100), numerous adjustments made in the final stages of
execution become apparent; hardly a single figure has been left unmodified
from the original plan. The obsession with perfection left the painter
little peace:
"Starting a new picture is very pleasant, for you always believe that
this time you're going to create a masterpiece; you take pains, and little
by little the painting takes shape, the effect comes through. You feel
marvelous sensations. When it's done, however, things are different. You
want to touch up the arm, the movement of the body doesn't seem graceful..,
and you end up doing nothing, for fear of having to redo the whole thing
completely."
The finely modeled flesh tones in his paintings led many critics to
accuse Bouguereau of relying too heavily on the badger blender. But
according to Emile Bayard:
"There has been talk of badger-blending, which still amuses the
artist, since he has never resorted to this technique ...."
Judging from photographs of the painter in his studio, Bouguereau
appears to have used the standard round and flat white bristle brushes
commonly used for oil painting (fig. 14). Lovis Corinth observed that the
artist generally preferred wide brushes. He also used a palette knife for
scumbling color into landscape passages and, for painting fine details, a
mahl stick.
The glazed passages in the paintings are primarily limited to the
darker portions, particularly backgrounds and drapery; conversely, the flesh
tones are solid and achieve their translucence by means of careful modeling
and precise observations of values and color notes. Richard Lack, a painter
of "the other twentieth century" -- that is, a painter who continues to
paint in the classical tradition -- has written:
"Alongside his mastery of line, Bouguereau utilizes tone relationships
with commanding authority. Harmony of dark and light tones is of first
importance in a painting. It is even more crucial than color since tone
arrangement must underlie every color scheme. Color or hue cannot exist
without value. Painters often say that any color scheme will suffice if the
values are harmoniously conceived. Bouguereau's handsome value harmonies are
like music of great beauty and subtlety .... An... ingenious use of light
and shadow is seen in the celebrated "Nymphes et satyre" [cat. no. 51]. The
figure grasping the left arm of the satyr is backlit with strong reflected
light pouring into the shadow side of the head and shoulders, posing one of
the most difficult problems for the draftsman. A head of this sort must be
modeled with a minimum of tone contrast in order to oppose those passages in
the light that are fully modeled. Once again, Bouguereau succeeds with
consumate authority."
One of the most impressive features of Bouguereau's renderings is the
manner whereby the artist expresses a maximum of form with a minimum of
means. Passages that appear to be modeled with nearly fiat tones acquire
volume through manipulation of contours and surrounding values.
The location of Bouguereau's first Paris studio is not known. But in
1866, the painter engaged the architect Jean-Louis Pascal to design his home
and atelier at 75 rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs, finally occupied in September
1868. Undoubtedly Bouguereau himself had an important hand in the planning
of the workspace.
The new atelier occupied the northern half of the upper floor of the
house and measured 11.5 x 9.5 meters (37 ft. 9 in. x 31 ft. 2 in.) with a
ceiling height of 6.9 meters (22 ft., 71/2 in.) (fig. 15). The long northern
wall of the studio was windowed from floor to ceiling and hung with heavy
drapery in order to control the light. In addition, there was a skylight
measuring 4 x 2.5 meters (13 ft 11/2 in. x 8 ft. 21/2 in.) in the exact
center of the ceiling. The lower surface of the skylight rested flush with
the ceiling and was composed of a wire-reinforced light-diffusing glass.
Just under the skylight a roll of opaque fabric was suspended that, by means
of wires and pulleys, could be extended along two guide wires in order to
regulate the amount of light entering from above. Originally, a sizeable
balcony projected from the central window; it was enclosed on all sides by
glass so as to form a small greenhouse, which in no way did obstructed the
light from entering the studio (fig. 16). The balcony, along with the glass
enclosure, was dismantled many years after Bouguereau's death, and there
presently remains only a narrow balcony and railing.
The interior of Bouguereau's atelier was painted a light, warm,
twenty-percent grey which visitors described as "luminous". The journalist
Paul Eudel has described a visit to the studio in 1888:
"At first glance, a real disappointment. No knickknacks, absolutely no
attempt at elegance. No suits of armor and no Gothic furniture either. It is
in no way a curio shop, like some sumptuously appointed studios that are
fitted for everything except painting. Here, on the contrary, there is
constant hard work ....
Seated in a corner, a cherubic pupil clutches a piece of cardboard on
his lap and tries, with a still shaky hand, to reproduce the academic
outlines of the bent head of Niobe, whose plaster mask hangs before him ....
The whole length of the studio is divided by a partition about two meters
high, covered with old, mediocre tapestries. Against the partition rests a
fine ebony Louis XIV clock ....
Perched on the mirrored cornice, two stuffed birds gaze dejectedly at
Duret's Chactas, which is made of plaster with a chocolate-hued patina and
which, from afar, could be mistaken for Florentine bronze ....
At the foot of the walls, painted in a terra-cotta shade, lean
portfolios crammed with drawings and sketches. On the floor, on shelves or
hanging from nails, Greek and Roman casts ....
I catch sight of a real Chardin, not a painting but a natural Chardin:
on a stepladder box lie three small pipes, a ruler, a yardstick, and a
sample of varnish, "guaranteed resin-free," the bottle of which holds down
its prospectus. It is a cosy room, unpretentious and very typical."
Bouguereau said of his atelier: "It is a workroom, that's all."
Elsewhere he described his work habits:
"Every morning I get up at seven without fail and have breakfast, then
I go up to my studio which I don't leave all day. Around three o'clock, a
light meal is brought in; I don't have to leave my work. I rarely have
visitors, since I hate to be disturbed. My friends, though, are always
welcome. They don't bother me, I can work even when it's noisy or while
they're chatting. When I'm painting, I don't pay attention to anything
else."
The artist usually spent August and September at his home in La
Rochelle (15 rue Verdiere), where his schedule was somewhat more relaxed.
Marius Vachon has written:
"In a comer of the garden measuring some two hundred square feet, he
arranged his outdoor studio; and in the orangery he set up his interior
studio. At six in the morning, rain or shine, drizzle or wind, escorted by
his three dogs and a servant, he sets out for a two-hour walk through the
fields or along the seashore. Once home, he has a cup of tea and settles
down to work. At eleven, the family gathers for lunch; at one, he resumes
work with his model and continues until six in the evening, with a few short
breaks.
Then the painter picks up his rustic cane and his soft-felt hat and
leaves, a cigarette between his lips, like any ordinary bourgeois, for a
walk around the harbor, to watch the sun set on the sea. When the town
clocks chime seven, he goes back home for dinner; and at ten, it is curfew
time. At dawn on Sundays, the master and his wife climb into a carriage to
meet a childhood friend, an architect in a neighboring village, for an
outing in the countryside or, during hunting season, to take a few pot
shots, in his own words, "at hypothetical quails or the occasional rabbit."
Many of the paintings which Bouguereau began in La Rochelle were
finished in Paris; usually all that remained to be done was the completion
of the background. He wrote one October:
"I still have landscape elements to paint into my backgrounds and I am
hurrying, fearing an early frost will leave only dry, leafless trees."
Bouguereau also produced certain paintings that do not belong to any
of the categories described above. These works were clearly not made as
preparatory studies and yet they often relate to important compositions.
>From time to time, in addition, he made drawings or tracings of drawings to
send to prospective clients interested in a commissioned work or a work in
progress. The artist also made pen drawings for reproduction purposes, since
halftone reproduction processes were both time consuming and expensive.
Bouguereau frequently painted "reductions" (sometimes Bouguereau
refers to these as "reproductions") as well, which were simply smaller
versions of important canvases. These works were finished to the same degree
as the large versions; they were signed but never dated. Sometimes
Bouguereau's students had a hand in the execution of the reductions; in
1877, he wrote his daughter: "Doyen... worked today on the completion of the
reduction of Youth and Eros ...."
The reductions originally served as models for the engravers, who
relied on them to make quality plates for reproduction purposes; in this way
the sales of important paintings were not delayed by the engraving process,
and the engraver was not encumbered by the bulk of Bouguereau's large
formats. Bouguereau painted most of his reductions early in his career; the
first one recorded is done for Charity, in 1859. After that, reductions
appear regularly and in great quantity; of sixteen paintings produced in
1867, eight were reductions. There are about a half dozen instances where
two reductions of the same painting were made.
Such proliferation, of course, could only have been intended for
commercial reasons. Neither Baschet nor Vachon recorded these early
reductions with any consistency, but they are listed in the artist's account
books.
But with time the painter seems to have grown weary of the practice,
and after 1870 reductions appear on the average of about two per year and
are usually limited to works from the annual Salon, destined for the
engraver. The reductions either progressed at the same time as the large
canvases or they were painted shortly after their completion; in any event,
Bouguereau required the large canvas for the execution of the reduction. He
explained to a correspondent:
"... You have not understood me. After telling you that I did not have
the time, I told you that I was unable to do the reproduction of a painting
I no longer had; this should have explained why I found it impossible to
fulfill the commission .... I should also add that today I no longer do any
reproductions other than for engraving purposes; that is because most of my
paintings are too cumbersome for the engraver to work directly from them, so
I am resigned to it. But it is always against my wishes.''
Most of Bouguereau's reductions appear to be faithful copies of the
large canvases, but there may be a few exceptions. There is an engraving of
L'Orage (The Storm), 1874, executed by Annedouche and published by Goupil,
which was presumably done from a reduction (of which no photographic record
has been found) and which has a completely different background from that of
the large version. The small version of The Storm is specifically mentioned
by Baschet as a "reduction pour la gravure" as opposed to simply
"reduction."
A detailed description of Bouguereau's materials and procedures must
not obscure the fact that it was above all the master's hand, eye, and
temperament, rather than pure technique, that account for the ineffable
quality of his work. For those who would invoke the painter's muse,
Bouguereau left a final caveat:
"One is born an artist. The artist is a man endowed with a special
nature, with a particular feeling for seeing form and color spontaneously,
as a whole, in perfect harmony. If one lacks that feeling, one is not an
artist and will never become an artist; and it is a waste of time to
entertain the possibility. This craft is acquired through study,
observation, and practice; it can improve by ceaseless work. But the
instinct for art is innate. First, one has to love nature with all one's
heart and soul, and be able to study and admire it for hours on end.
Everything is in nature. A plant, a leaf, a blade of grass should be the
subjects of infinite and fruitful meditations; for the artist, a cloud
floating in the sky has form, and the form affords him joy, helps him
think."
Bouguereau at Work
1. Bouguereau's collection of photographs was extensive and included
prints by many of the best known photographers of his time as well as by
lesser-knowns.
2. William Bouguereau, "Discours de M. Bouguereau" in Seance publique
annuelle des cinq Academies du 24 October 1885, lnstitut de France, pp.
10-11.
3. R.H. Ives Gaminell, Twilight of Painting (New York: G.P. Putnam's
Sons, 1946), pp. 66-67.
4. 12 mile Bayard, "William Bouguereau" in Le Monde Moderne (Paris: A.
Quantin), December 1897, pp. 851-852.
5. Linda Nochlin, Realism (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1978) p. 104.
6. Robert Isaacson, "The Evolution of Bouguereau's Grand Manner" in
The Minneapolis Institute of Arts Bulletin,, Vol. LXII, 1975, pp. 7576.
7. Anonymous, "First Caresses" in [?], from the files of the Joslyn
Art Museum Library, Omaha, Nebraska.
8. Carroll Beckwith, "Bouguereau" in The Cosmopolitan, January 1890,
Vol. 8. No. 3, p. 264.
9. William Bouguereau, quoted by Emile Bayard, p. 854.
10. William Bouguereau, Paris Journal, p. 19. Bouguereau Family
Estate.
11. Ibid. p. 20.
12. William Bouguereau, "Allocution de M. Bouguereau" in Distribution
des Prix de l'Ecole de Dessin au Grand Theatre, 1899, (Bordeaux, 1899), pp.
17-18.
13. Ldandre Vaillat, "Une resurrection de Bouguereau" in
L'Illustration, 22 janvier 1921, p.' 64.
14. Jehan-Georges Vibert, La science de la peinture (Paris: Paul
Ollendorff), 1891, pp. 324-325.
15. William Bouguereau, carnet No. 2, 1894. Bouguereau Family Estate.
16. In fact, Cennino Cennini mentions nothing about the incorporation
of flour into the ground. Moreau-Vauthier's reference is surely the same as
the one in Bouguereau's handwriting, found on a card inserted in Sketchbook
No. 5, 1869 (Bouguereau Family Estate), to Giovanni Battista Armenini, Dei
veri precetti della pittura. The relevant passage reads: Ci song molti che
prima turano i buchi alle tele con misture di farina, olio ed un terzo di
bidccd ben trita, e ve la mettonG su con un coltello... Bouguereau's notes
from Armenin-i read as follows: farine-huile-blanc-ben trita iraprima, avec
un 6e de vernis du vernis dans tous les glacis vernis huile d'abezzo claire
- a petit feu huile de sasso etendu ti chaud mastic huile de noix (au leu)
passe dans un linge pendam qu'il [?] un peu d'alun calcine et pulverise le
rend plus brillant (le meler aux bleux, aux lapis qu'il fait secher)
17. Charles Moreau-Vauthier, Comment on peint aujourd'hui (Paris:
Henri Floury, 1923), pp. 46-47.
18. Frangois Flameng, "Notice sur la vie et les travaux de M.
Bouguereau," Seance du 24 fevrier 1906, Academie des Beaux-Arts, p. 16.
19. Camille Bellanger, cited in A. Lemassier, "Comment peignaient les
grands peintres: William Bouguereau" in Peintures-Pigments-Vernis,
I.)ecember 1962, Vol. 38. No. 12, p. 734.
20. Jerome Doucet, Les peintres francais (Paris: Librairie Felix Juven,
1906), p. 169. 21. Emile Bayard, cited in A. Lemassier, p. 733. 22. Frangois
Flameng, "Notice...", p. 16.
23. William Bouguereau, quoted in "M. Bouguereau chez lui" in L'Eclair,
9 May 1891.
24. Ibid.
25. Siccatif de Courtrai" was a term
applied to dryers of diverse quality made by many different manufacturers,
each of whom seems to have use a different recipe. This lack of uniformity
may well have been the real cause of the siccative's bad reputation.
Siccatif de Courtrai was made by heating linseed oil in the presence of
litharge and a salt of manganese. According to Ludovic Pierre, the siccative,
when used correctly, did not impair the longevity of a painting: "It is a very powerful siccative when it is well made; it is also
sufficient to add it in small proportions to the color one desires to dry
rapidly. We believe that when used with the greatest moderation, it is not
as delaterious as has been suggested by some, but obviously one has to be
cautious. Its dark brown color.., looks like black coffee and tends to muddy
lighter tones... (Ludovic Pierre. Renseignements sur les couleurs, vernis,
huiles, essences, siccatifs et fixatifs employes dans la peinture artistique
(Paris: Imp. F. Schmidt, n.d.), pp. 100-101)" Bouguereau also mentions "huile
grasse" in some of his formulas. The substance seems to have been either
Courtrai or something very similar.
Again according to Pierre:
"Huile grasse a tableau" is linseed oil heated with a small quantity
of lead and manganese products which render it very siccative (Pierre, p.
89). The fact that Bouguereau refers to it once as "huile grasse brune"
would also lead one to believe that it was basically the same product as "siccatif
de Courtrai." Bouguereau also mentions the use of "huile grasse blanche;"
Pierre gives the following information: "Huile grasse blanche" is pure
clarified poppy oil treated in a special way with certain siccative agents
using a base of lead and manganese; it acquires siccative properties without
becoming discolored. Thus it is sold under the name "huile grasse blanche."
We can be no more precise as to its employ than we can for "huile grasse a
tableau." It is never transparent, but always displays a somewhat milky
appearance.
Pierre also gives a description of "Siccatif de Haarlem":
"Siccatif de Haarlem" was invented by M. Durozier the pharmacist, now
deceased. We can do no better than repeat what he said himself about his
product. This siccative replaces "huile grasse" and all the other siccatives
using lead bases; it is characterized by its ability to preserve tones,
inhibit "sinking in," and prevent cracking. It can be diluted with both oil
and turpentine; it renders glazes solid and can serve as the final varnish
when extended with rectified turpentine.
(Pierre, p. 101)
Products bearing the names "siccatif de Haarlem Duroziez [sic}" and "siccatif
flamand" are still manufactured by Lefranc & Bourgeois; one of their
brochures gives the following description: "Siccatif de Haarlem Duruziez":
This painting medium is, like "siccatif flamand" made from a base of
Madagascar copal resin. While it is less concentrated, it possesses the same
characteristics. Besides the difference in color, it dries less rapidly than
"siccatif flamand." (Les mediums pour les couleurs a l'huile [Paris: Lefranc
& Bourgeois, 1982], h.p.). Ludovic Pierre comments on "siccatif flareand,"
which was also an invention of Duroziez:
..."Siccatif flamand" could be called the twin brother of "siccatif de
Haarlem. "... in a technical sense, this product is not a true siccative,
although it does facilitate drying of the colors to which it is added; it is
composed of oil, turpentine, and hard copal resin. "Siccatif flamand"
contains no lead and may be mixed with turpentine in all proportions without
coagulating. it can be added to oil colors without fear of the colors
altering as they age. It is only slightly colored and has no effect on light
tones (Pierre, p. 102).
Hilaire Hiller gives the following information concerning oliesse:
A painting medium used by Gerome: Oil copal varnish mixed with
Duroziez oil - 4 parts Rectified oil of spike or turpentine - 3 parts Mix well by agitation, pouring the spike or turps on the copal-oil
mixture. Girardot said that this medium gave paintings "the solidity of
flint." The Duroziez oil is prepared by the firm of Duroziez of Paris, and
it is known by the trade name of Oliesse. (Hilaire Hiller, Notes on the
Technique of Painting (New York: Wastson-Guptill, 1969), p. 167, reprinted
from the edition of 1934.)
26. Charles Moreau-Vauthier, Comment on peint aujourd'hui, pp. 37, 38,
63, 64.
27. "Terebine" is not to be confused with "terebenthine" (turpentine).
Bouguereau notes: " Terebine sold at the color merchant, 3 or 5 Quai
Voltaire, can replace, siccatif soleil, which in turn can replace siccative
of Courtrai (Sketch book No. 2, 1894.) According to M. Henri Sennelier of
Sennelier, 3 quai Voltaire, " terebine " was a" dryer made with American
turpentine" (iiiore siccative by itself than its European conterpart).
Apparently, terebine was a variation of "terebine francais" which contained
one of several possible dryers, among them; resinate de plomb (lead resinate)
linoleate de plomb (lead linoleate) linoleate de manganese (manganese
linoleate)
It is probable that terebine was the same product known today as "Siccatif
de Courtrai, blanc." Ludovic Pierre describes the latter: ...A siccative
with a turpentine base which is extremely clear, almost without color, but
which certainly has none of the siccative energy of true "Siccatif de
Courtrai," for it dries the colors much less rapidly and does not harden
them as well (Pierre, p. 101).
28. Charles Moreau-Vauthier, Comment on peint aujourd'hui, p. 24.
29. William Bouguereau, sketchbook No. 5, 1869. Bouguereau Family
Estate.
30. William Bouguereau, excerpt from a letter published in Les
peintres et la couleur (Paris: Lefranc, 1925), n.p.
31. William Bouguereau, sketchbook No. 2, 1894. Bouguereau Family
Estate.
32. Charles Moreau-Vauthier, La Peinture (Paris: Hachette, 1913), p.
210.
33. Charles Moreau-Vauthier, Comment on peint aujourd'hui, p. 21.
34. William Bouguereau, quoted in "M. Bouguereau chez lui", n.p.
35. Emile Bayard, "William Bouguereau" in Le Monde Moderne, p. 854.
36. Richard Lack, Bouguereau's Legacy to the Student of Painting
(Minneapolis: Atelier Lack, Inc., 1982), p. 4.
37. The birds served the artist as models for the plumage of his
angels and cupids.
38. Paul Eudel, "Les ateliers des peintres: William Bouguereau", in
L'lllustration, 30 June 1888.
39. William Bouguereau, quoted in "M. Bouguereau chez lui."
40. ibid.
41. Vachon, p. 99.
42. William Bouguereau, letter to Eugene Bouguereau, Paris 16 October
1886. Bouguereau Family Estate.
43. William Bouguereau, letter to Henriette Bouguereau, 22 July 1877.
Bouguereau Family Estate.
44. These were for: The Elder Sister, 1863; The Prayer, 1865;
Invocation to the Virgin, 1866; First Caresses, 1866; Covetousness, 1866;
and Sleeping Children, 1868.
45. Sketchbook No. 32 (1861-1875), sketchbook No. 33 (1866-1886), and
sketchbook No. 34 (1882-1894). Bouguereau Family Estate.
46. William Adolphe Bouguereau, letter to [?], 23 August 1871, La
Rochelle. Collection of Mark Steven Walker.
47. Ludovic Baschet, Catalogue illustre des oeuvres de W. Bouguereau
(Paris: Librairie d'Art, 1885), p. 51.
