He has been compared to the Venetian Renaissance painter Tiepolo for his masterly decorative painting. Pierre Victor Galland (1822-1892) was born in Geneva, Switzerland but the French were perfectly happy to appropriate him as one of their own. Like Beneveneto Cellini, he studied goldsmithing and that apprenticeship with his father confirmed his joyous approach to art. We may not regard images of nymphs or cherubs with uncomplicated pleasure but we can enjoy an artist who could create them.
Here we have two works by Galland: the first is a pastel and pencil drawing from the Musee des Arts Decoratifs and the second an oil painting based on that study from the Musee D'Orsay. Without traveling across, Paris we can view both, admire their respective merits, and choose between them if we must. I can't. The painting is a veritable riot of botanical representation and a tour de force of composition. Clearly, Galland had an admiration for nature's ability to rival his best and most careful effects that he displays here. He leads the eye up from the redcaps via the curving vines to the background light and then brings us back to the beginning with shades of yellow in the foreground. Then look at the calming pastel, its minimal detailing fleshed out in translucent shades of red and brown, green and yellow.
4 comments:
Heisann!
Thank you for leading me into the world of Galland´s paintings and artworks. I did not know him!
Have a nice evening!
Your post raises two questions for me. First question is: who could ever compare him to Tiepolo? (I guess we are talking about Giambattista: AFAIK there are at least three!) I really can't see the similarities. Perhaps we know Tiepolo better than they did in those days?
Second question is: what is the nationality of a painter, or an artist for that matter? Marcel Duchamp was born French; part of his career was in France but he had the most lasting influence in America - and indeed didn't he finish his career in America? Is he a French or an American artist?
Similarly, is Picasso a Spanish or a French artist? He is most definitely both & a Parisian artist. Would we look at Van Gogh's paintings, were it not for the few years he spent in France? Where does Poussin fit better? In the history of French painting or in the history of Italian painting? Probably in both - but he became a great artist in Italy... How about Claude? His country - Lorraine - no longer exists...
Nationality is a pigeonhole. In some cases it is useful. It remains a pigeonhole nonetheless.
http://davidikus.blogspot.com/
PS. Let's not mention Henry James, the greatest British writer born in America...
Welcome, Vilt og vakkert. There is more of Galland's work on the internet, to be sure. I'm happy that you enjoyed these two.
Davidikus,I take the Tiepolo comparison to be a reference to Galland's many frescoes. It comes from the 2007 retrospective at the Musee departmentale de l'Oise, Beauvais, France, titled "A Tiepolo for the 19th Century."
Your point about organzing by nationality is well taken. It's a bit of a running stick in these pages to laugh (gently) at creeping French hegemony in the arts. Since French is my only language other than English (at this point, I plead guilty to being part of the problem.
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