Henri Fantin-Latour

Henri Fantin-Latour – First successes with copies of old masters

Henri Fantin-Latour was born in Grenoble on 14 January 1836. He learnt the basics of drawing and painting from his father Jean-Théodore Fantin-Latour, exhibiting such great talent, that he was recommended for further tuition with Horace Lecoq de Boisbaudran. He was instructed by the French painter and teacher according to his special training method, based on visual memory, for four years. Subsequent attendance at the École nationale supériore des beaux-arts de Paris in 1854, on the other hand, fell short of expectations when Fantin-Latour had to end his studies after only three months because he was deemed to be making insufficient progress. Like many other young painters, he regularly visited the Louvre to study and copy the old masters, where he met Edgar Degas in 1855, Édouard Manet in 1857 and Berthe Morisot in 1858. Hs copies were so skilled that he found numerous English and American buyers. 

Realistic flower still lifes as coveted trademark

In 1859, Henri Fantin-Latour made contact with English art circles when his American friend and fellow painter James McNeill Whistler invited him to London, and the Briton Alphonse Legros arranged for an appropriate introduction. That same year, the young painter made one of his most important acquaintances: In Gustave Courbet, he found a friend and mentor and collaborated with him in his workshop for two years. It was here that Fantin-Latour learnt and developed his realistic painting style, for which his still lifes are famous still today. Although he counted many Impressionist artists amongst his close friends, he remained true to his realistic painting style, and in 1863, was one of the few painters who exhibited at both the Paris Salon and the alternative Salon des Refusés. His almost photorealistic pictures were valued equally by the public, critics, and fellow artists. In 1864, he showed his works in the Royal Academy of Arts in London; his realistic floral still lifes met with a large and interested clientele in England. 

The bridge from Realism to Symbolism

Henri Fantin-Latour intensively explored the themes of the German opera composer Richard Wagner, thus entirely in tune with the current of his time. His enthusiasm for music and mythology often inspired him to create fantastical compositions which he usually executed not as paintings, but as masterful lithographs, with which he heralded and strongly influenced the later current of Symbolism. In 1876, he married his painter friend Victoria Dubourg, and from then on spent the summer months at the home of her family in Buré (Orne). As well as his famous still lifes, Henri Fantin-Latour also painted several solo and group portraits, of which Hommage à Delacroix and Un atelier aux Batignolles, in particular, achieved widespread fame, also because numerous contemporary artist colleagues, painters and writers were depicted in them in Fantin-Latour’s usual detailed and lifelike manner. 

Henri Fantin-Latour died in Buré (Orne) on 25 August 1904. Marcel Proust mentioned the painter in his famous work The Search for Lost Time, whilst Peter Saville chose a floral still life for the cover of the music album Power, Corruption & Lies, by the rock band New Order.