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{{short description|French painter}}
{{short description|French painter (1928–1999)}}


{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2014}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2014}}
{{Infobox artist
{{Infobox artist
| name = Bernard Buffet
| name = Bernard Buffet
| image = 023-_Bernard_Buffet_dans_son_atelier_du_Domaine_de_la_Baume_à_Tourtour_pour_l'exposition_20_000_lieux_sous_les_mers_1989-_©photo_Danielle_Buffet.tif
| image = 023-_Bernard_Buffet_dans_son_atelier_du_Domaine_de_la_Baume_à_Tourtour_pour_l'exposition_20_000_lieux_sous_les_mers_1989-_©photo_Danielle_Buffet.tif
| caption = Bernard Buffet in his studio in Tourtour, France (1989) Credits: Danielle Buffet
| caption = Bernard Buffet in his studio in Tourtour, France (1989) Credits: Danielle Buffet
| birth_name =
| birth_name =
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| death_date = {{Death date and age|1999|10|4|1928|7|10|df=y}}
| death_date = {{Death date and age|1999|10|4|1928|7|10|df=y}}
| death_place = [[Tourtour]], France
| death_place = [[Tourtour]], France
| field = [[Painting]], [[drawing]], [[printmaking]]
| nationality = French
| field = [[Painting]], [[Drawing]], [[Printmaking]]
| training = [[École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts]], [[Marie-Thérèse Auffray]]
| training = [[École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts]], [[Marie-Thérèse Auffray]]
| movement = [[Expressionism]]
| movement = [[Expressionism]]
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Officer of the [[Légion d'Honneur]],1973<br />
Officer of the [[Légion d'Honneur]],1973<br />
Member of the [[Académie des Beaux-Arts]], 1974
Member of the [[Académie des Beaux-Arts]], 1974
| signature = MBB 1.jpg
}}
}}
'''Bernard Buffet''' ({{IPA-fr|byfɛ|lang}}; 10 July 1928 – 4 October 1999) was a French [[Painting|painter]], printmaker, and sculptor.
'''Bernard Buffet''' ({{IPA|fr|byfɛ|lang}}; 10 July 1928 – 4 October 1999) was a French [[Painting|painter]], printmaker, and sculptor. An extremely prolific artist, he produced a varied and extensive body of work. His style was exclusively figurative and is often classified as [[Expressionist]] or "miserabilist".<ref name=NYT2016/>


Buffet enjoyed worldwide popularity in the 1950s and was often compared to [[Pablo Picasso]] for his fame and talent. By the end of the 1950s, however, the public and art community turned strongly against him due to changing artistic tastes, Buffet's lavish lifestyle, and his extremely prolific output. The 21st century saw a renewed interest in his oeuvre.<ref name=NYT2016/>
He produced a varied and extensive body of work. His style was exclusively figurative. The artist enjoyed worldwide popularity early in his career but was shunned by art pundits later on.


== Early life ==
Today, there is a renewed interest in Bernard Buffet's oeuvre. His works can be seen in the collections of the world's leading museums, including the [[Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris]], the [[Tate]], and the [[Museum of Modern Art]].
Bernard Buffet was born in 1928 in Paris, where he spent his childhood.<ref name=NYT2016></ref> He was from a middle-class family with roots in Northern and Western France. His mother often took him to the [[Louvre|Louvre Museum]], where he became familiar with the works of [[Realism (arts)|Realist]] painters, such as [[Gustave Courbet]]. This is likely to have influenced his style.{{citation needed|date=August 2023}} In 1955, he painted [https://arthive.com/artists/61972~Bernard_Buffet/works/401556~D_aprs_Le_sommeil_Courbet a work that paid tribute to Courbet's] ''[[Le Sommeil]].'' <ref>{{cite book |last1=Buffet |first1=Bernard |title=Rétrospective Bernard Buffet |date=2016 |publisher=Paris musées |location=Paris |isbn=978-2-7596-0331-2 |pages=72-73}}</ref>


Bernard Buffet was a student at the [[Lycée Carnot]] during the Nazi occupation of Paris. He travelled to drawings courses in the evenings despite the curfew imposed by the Nazi authorities. He then studied art at the [[École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts]] (National School of the Fine Arts)<ref name=Ind> {{cite web |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/bernard-buffet-the-invention-of-the-megaartist-by-nicholas-foulkes-book-review-paris-prodigy-turned-pariah-a6813096.html |title=Bernard Buffet: the Invention of the Mega-artist by Nicholas Foulkes, book review: Paris prodigy turned pariah |last=Atlee |first=James |date=14 January 2016 |work=[[The Independent]] |access-date=3 August 2023 |quote=}}</ref> and worked in the studio of the painter [[Eugène Narbonne]]. Among his classmates were [[Maurice Boitel]] and Louis Vuillermoz. He met the French painter [[Marie-Thérèse Auffray]] and was influenced by her work.{{citation needed|date=August 2023}}
== Biography ==
Bernard Buffet was born in 1928. He hailed from a middle-class family with roots in Northern and Western France. His spent his childhood in Paris. His mother often took him to the [[Louvre|Louvre Museum]], where he got familiar with the works of [[Realism (arts)|Realist]] painters, such as [[Gustave Courbet]]. This is likely to have influenced his style. In 1955, he painted a work that paid tribute to Courbet's ''[[Le Sommeil]].''


Buffet's mother, Blanche, died from breast cancer in 1945. Seventeen-year-old Buffet was devastated. Losing his mother at an early age remained a source of melancholy throughout his life.{{citation needed|date=August 2023}}
Bernard Buffet was a student at the [[Lycée Carnot]] during the Nazi occupation of Paris. He travelled to drawings courses in the evenings despite the curfew imposed by the Nazi authorities. He then studied art at the [[École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts]] (National School of the Fine Arts) and worked in the studio of the painter [[Eugène Narbonne]]. Among his classmates were [[Maurice Boitel]] and [[Louis Vuillermoz]]. He met the French painter [[Marie-Thérèse Auffray]] and was influenced by her work.


== Rise to fame ==
Buffet's mother, Blanche, died from breast cancer in 1945. Seventeen-year-old Buffet was devastated. Losing his mother at an early age remained a source of melancholy throughout his life.
[[File:Charles-DeGaulle-TIME-1959.jpg|thumb|Charles de Gaulle by Buffet]]
As a painter, Buffet produced religious pieces, landscapes, portraits and [[still-life]]s. Influenced by [[Francis Gruber]],<ref name="ArtUK">{{cite web |url=https://artuk.org/discover/artists/gruber-francis-19121948 |title=Francis Gruber |last= |first= |date= |website=[[Art UK]] |publisher= |access-date=1 August 2023 |quote=}}</ref><ref name=Berardo> {{cite web |url= https://en.museuberardo.pt/collection/artists/219 |title=Francis Gruber |last= |first= |date= |website= |publisher=[[Berardo Collection Museum]] |access-date=1 August 2023 |quote=}}</ref> he often painted "Miserabilist" scenes of despair, including scenes of poverty and [[Holocaust]] victims, but he also portrayed subjects as varied as ashtrays, clowns, and table lamps.<ref name=NYT2016></ref><ref name=NYT99></ref> His work was characterized by thick black lines, elongated forms, and a lack of [[depth of field]].<ref name=NYT2016></ref><ref name=NYT99> {{cite web |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1999/10/05/arts/bernard-buffet-french-painter-dies-at-71.html |title=Bernard Buffet, French Painter, Dies at 71 |last=Smith |first=Roberta |date=October 5, 1999 |website=[[The New York Times]] |publisher= |access-date=August 3, 2023 |quote=}}</ref>


Sustained by the picture-dealer [[Maurice Garnier]], Buffet produced religious pieces, landscapes, portraits and [[still-life]]s. In 1946, he had his first painting shown, a self-portrait, at the Salon des Moins de Trente Ans at the Galerie Beaux-Arts. He had at least one major exhibition every year. Buffet illustrated "Les Chants de Maldoror" written by [[Comte de Lautréamont]] in 1952. In 1955, he was awarded the first prize by the magazine Connaissance des Arts, which named the ten best post-war artists. In 1958, at the age of 30, the first retrospective of his work was held at the Galerie Charpentier.
In 1946, he had his first painting shown, a self-portrait, at the Salon des Moins de Trente Ans at the Galerie Beaux-Arts. In 1948, he won his first major prize, the Prix de Critique, sharing it with fellow Expressionist [[Bernard Lorjou]].<ref name=Cornell>Cornell, Kenneth. "The Buffet Enigma." ''Yale French Studies'', no. 19/20, 1957, pp. 94–97. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/2930427. Accessed 4 Aug. 2023.</ref>


An extremely prolific painter, he had at least one major exhibition every year. By the age 26, it was said that he had completed more paintings than [[Pierre-Auguste Renoir]]'s lifetime output.<ref name=NYT99></ref> In 1948, gallerist Maurice Garnier began showing Buffet's work, and by 1977, his gallery was devoted solely to Buffet.<ref name=NYT2016></ref>
[[Pierre Bergé]] was Buffet's live-in lover until Bergé left Buffet for [[Yves Saint Laurent (designer)|Yves Saint Laurent]].<ref name = poser>John Lichfield. [https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/bernard-buffet-return-of-the-poser-1645748.html "Bernard Buffet: Return of the 'Poser'"]. ''The Independent'', 16 March 2009. Retrieved on 26 July 2014.</ref>


By the age of 21, Buffet was already considered one of the greatest stars of the art world, frequently compared to [[Pablo Picasso]].<ref name=Ind></ref> A 1958 article in ''[[The New York Times]]'' called him one of the "Fabulous Five" cultural figures of post-war France (the other four were [[Brigitte Bardot]], [[Françoise Sagan]], [[Roger Vadim]], and [[Yves Saint Laurent (designer)|Yves Saint Laurent]]).<ref name=NYT99></ref>
On 12 December 1958, Buffet married the writer and actress Annabel Schwob. They adopted three children.<ref>{{Cite web | author = Elisabeth Sancey (interview with Nicholas Buffett). | title=Survivre à des parents terribles (Deuxième partie) |date = October 17, 2009 | website = parismatch.com | url=http://www.parismatch.com/Culture/Livres/franoise-sagan-nicolas-buffet-alcool-143654}}</ref> Daughter Virginie was born in 1962; daughter Danielle, in 1963; and son Nicolas, in 1973. Bernard Buffet was named "Chevalier de la [[Legion of Honour|Légion d'Honneur]]" in 1973.


Buffet illustrated "Les Chants de Maldoror" written by [[Comte de Lautréamont]] in 1952. In 1955, he was awarded the first prize by the magazine Connaissance des Arts, which named the ten best post-war artists. In 1958, at the age of 30, the first retrospective of his work was held at the Galerie Charpentier.
On 23 November 1973, the Bernard Buffet Museum was founded by Kiichiro Okano, in Surugadaira, Japan.

He was commissioned to make the portrait of [[Charles de Gaulle]] for the 1958 ''[[Time Person of the Year|Time Man of the Year]]'' magazine cover.

== Later career ==
However, by the end of the 1950s, both the public and the art world had turned against Buffet. His lavish lifestyle--including a [[Rolls Royce]] with a chauffeur and a private castle in Provence<ref name=NYT99></ref>--made him seem out of touch with the still-struggling economy of post-war France, which he had memorably portrayed in his early paintings.<ref name=Ind></ref><ref name=Newsweek> {{cite web |url=https://www.newsweek.com/qa-author-nick-foulkes-reinvention-bernard-buffet-nicholas-416313 |title=Q&A: Author Nick Foulkes on the Reinvention of painter Bernard Buffet |last=Faloyin |first=Dipo |date=August 3, 2023 |website=[[Newsweek]] |publisher= |access-date=August 3, 2023 |quote=}}</ref> A 1956 magazine photograph of Buffet being helped into his car by the chauffeur was a particular turning point in the public's views of him.<ref name=NYT2016></ref> Another magazine published photographs of Buffet's lifestyle--large castle, expensive furniture, well-fed dogs--alongside the miserable figures of his paintings to implicitly accuse him of hypocrisy.<ref name=Cornell></ref>

Picasso further worsened Buffet's reputation by publicly denigrating his work, and Buffet also attracted the enmity of novelist [[André Malraux]], the powerful French Minister of Culture.<ref name=poser>{{cite web |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/bernard-buffet-return-of-the-poser-1645748.html |title=Bernard Buffet: Return of the 'poser' |last=Lichfield |first=John |date=March 16, 2009 |website=[[The Independent]] |publisher= |access-date=August 3, 2023 |quote=}}</ref> Finally, Buffet's critical reputation was also affected by his tremendous and sometimes indiscriminate output. In the 1990s, he claimed he had completed a painting a day for more than four decades. In the words of one art historian, many of these works were "unequivocally bad".<ref name=Ind></ref>

Despite his reduced reputation, Bernard Buffet was named "Chevalier de la [[Legion of Honour|Légion d'Honneur]]" in 1973. On 23 November 1973, the Bernard Buffet Museum was founded by Kiichiro Okano, a private collector in Surugadaira, Japan.<ref name=NYT2016></ref>


At the request of the French postal administration in 1978, he designed a stamp depicting the Institut et le Pont des Arts – on this occasion the Post Museum arranged a retrospective of his works.<ref>''Bernard Buffet Maler Painter Peintre'' (brochure), [[Museum für Moderne Kunst]], [[Frankfurt]], April 2008.</ref>
At the request of the French postal administration in 1978, he designed a stamp depicting the Institut et le Pont des Arts – on this occasion the Post Museum arranged a retrospective of his works.<ref>''Bernard Buffet Maler Painter Peintre'' (brochure), [[Museum für Moderne Kunst]], [[Frankfurt]], April 2008.</ref>
Line 49: Line 60:
Buffet created more than 8,000 paintings and many [[Printmaking|prints]] as well.
Buffet created more than 8,000 paintings and many [[Printmaking|prints]] as well.


== Personal life and death ==
Buffet died by [[suicide]] at his home in [[Tourtour]], southern France, on 4 October 1999.<ref name = poser /> He was suffering from [[Parkinson's disease]] and was no longer able to work. Police said that Buffet died around 4 p.m after putting his head in a plastic bag attached around his neck with tape.
Buffet was bisexual, and his paintings have been noted for their [[homoerotic]] themes.<ref name=Ind></ref> Industrialist [[Pierre Bergé]] was Buffet's live-in lover for eight years from 1950 to 1958, recalling later that the two were "never apart for a single day."<ref> {{cite web |url=https://museeyslparis.com/en/biography/les-annees-bernard-buffet |title=The Bernard Buffet years |last= |first= |date= |website=The Yves St Laurent Museum |publisher= |access-date=3 August 2023 |quote=}}</ref> In 1958, Bergé left Buffet for Yves Saint Laurent.<ref name = poser />


On 12 December 1958, Buffet married the writer and actress Annabel Schwob. They adopted three children.<ref>{{Cite web | author = Elisabeth Sancey (interview with Nicholas Buffett). | title=Survivre à des parents terribles (Deuxième partie) |date = 17 October 2009 | website = parismatch.com | url=http://www.parismatch.com/Culture/Livres/franoise-sagan-nicolas-buffet-alcool-143654}}</ref> Daughter Virginie was born in 1962; daughter Danielle, in 1963; and son Nicolas, in 1973.
The popularity of Buffet's work, as well as the level of media attention around his lifestyle, were quite high in the 1950s and 1960s. Although he kept on painting throughout his life, there was a certain decline in interest in his work in the last decades of the 20th century, especially in France. This decline in popularity was partly influenced by his fall from grace with French art pundits, whose support and interest shifted away from figurative art.


Buffet died by [[suicide]] at his home in [[Tourtour]], southern France, on 4 October 1999.<ref name = poser /> He was suffering from [[Parkinson's disease]] and was no longer able to work.<ref name=NYT2016></ref> Police said that Buffet died after putting his head in a plastic bag attached around his neck with tape.<ref> {{cite web |url=https://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2016/08/french-artist-bernard-buffet |title=Forgotten French Artist Bernard Buffet Finally Gets a Re-appraisal |last=Friend |first=David |date=4 August 2023 |website=[[Vanity Fair (magazine)|Vanity Fair]] |publisher= |access-date=4 August 2023 |quote=}}</ref>
In the 21st century, there has been a renewed spike in interest in the work of Buffet. With some successful exhibitions in France and throughout the world. In 2016, British author [[Nicholas Foulkes]] published [https://www.amazon.co.uk/Bernard-Buffet-Invention-Modern-Mega-artist/dp/1848094442 ''Bernard Buffet: The Invention of the Modern Mega-Artist''], in which he offers a controversial biographical account of Buffet's life and work.


==Legacy==
==Theme exhibitions (selection)==
In the 21st century, there has been a renewed spike in interest in the work of Buffet.<ref name=NYT2016>{{cite web |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/20/arts/design/bernard-buffet-revival-and-retrospective.html |title=Buffet: A Life of Success, Rejection and Now a Celebration |last=Lankarani |first=Nazanin |date=October 20, 2016 |website=[[The New York Times]] |publisher= |access-date=August 3, 2023 |quote=}}</ref> His work is particularly popular in Asia and former Soviet Union nations.<ref name=Newsweek></ref> In 2016, Paris's [[Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris|Musée d’Art Moderne]] held a large retrospective of his work, the first held in France since his death, though its curator acknowledged that it was a risky exhibition given Buffet's lingering reputation as the "ultimate in bad taste".<ref name=NYT2016></ref> Also in 2016, British author [[Nicholas Foulkes]] published ''Bernard Buffet: The Invention of the Modern Mega-Artist'', in which he offers a biographical account of Buffet's life and work.<ref name=Newsweek></ref>
* 1952 La Passion du Christ

* 1954 Horreur de la Guerre
Corresponding with this renewed interest, some of Buffet's work also saw rising appraisals in the early 21st century. In 2015, his painting ''Le Cri du Clown'' (1970) sold for 3.15 million Hong Kong dollars ($410,000 USD) in an auction in Hong Kong. That same year, [[Christie's]] auction house in London sold Buffet's ''Les Clowns Musiciens, le Saxophoniste'' (1991) for £1,022,500, which set the record for the highest-selling work by the artist.<ref name=NYT2016></ref>
* 1958 Jeanne d'Arc
* 1961 Portraits d'Annabel
* 1962 La Chapelle de Château l'Arc
* 1965 Les ecorches
* 1967 La corrida
* 1971 Les Folles
* 1977 L'enfer de Dante
* 1978 The French Revolution
* 1989 Vingt mille lieues sous les mers
* 1991 Souvenirs d'Italie
* 1991 New York
* 1992 Les Clowns Musiciens
* 1992 Saint-Petersburg
* 1993 L'Empire ou les plaisirs de la guerre
* 1993 Promenade Provencale
* 1995 Sept peches capitaux
* 1996 Pekin
* 1998 La maison
* 1999 Mes Singes
* 2000 La mort


==Awards==
==Awards==
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* 1973 Officer of the [[Légion d'Honneur]]
* 1973 Officer of the [[Légion d'Honneur]]
* 1974 Member of the [[Académie des Beaux-Arts]]
* 1974 Member of the [[Académie des Beaux-Arts]]

==Collections (selection)==
* ARTAX, Düsseldorf
* Boca Raton Museum of Art
* Ca la Ghironda, Bologna
* Kunstmuseum Walter, Augsburg
* Musée d´art moderne de Lille, Villeneuve d´Ascq
* Museum of Contemporary Art, Skopje
* National Gallery for Foreign Art, Sofia
* National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa
* National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo
* Tampere Art Museum
* Tate Gallery, London
* Wellside Gallery, Seoul
* Alexandre de Bothuri collection, Palm Beach, USA " Le Clown Jaune" 1955

==Cultural references==
===Film===
* ''Bernard Buffet'', a 1956 film by [[Étienne Périer (director)|Étienne Périer]]


==References==
==References==
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{{Commons category|Bernard Buffet}}
{{Commons category|Bernard Buffet}}
* [http://museebernardbuffet.com/ Musée Bernard Buffet]
* [http://museebernardbuffet.com/ Musée Bernard Buffet]
* [https://www.artmajeur.com/grayportraits/en/artworks/3695002/portrait-of-bernard-buffet-this-work-was-painted-after-a-drawing-from-life-that-gray-made-in-1963 Portrait of Bernard Buffet] on [[Artmajeur]] by [[Reginald Gray (artist)|Reginald Gray]] (2009, after a drawing from life made by Gray in 1963)
* [http://www.artnet.com/magazine_pre2000/news/darmon/darmon10-25-99.asp Artnet.com Report from Paris by Adrian Darmon 10-25-99: Buffet obituary]
* [https://www.artmajeur.com/grayportraits/en/artworks/3695002/portrait-of-bernard-buffet-this-work-was-painted-after-a-drawing-from-life-that-gray-made-in-1963 Portrait of Bernard Buffet] by [[Reginald Gray (artist)|Reginald Gray]] (2009, after a drawing from life made by Gray in 1963)


{{Authority control (arts)}}
{{Authority control (arts)}}


{{DEFAULTSORT:Buffet, Bernard}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Buffet, Bernard}}
[[Category:20th-century French painters]]
[[Category:20th-century French male artists]]
[[Category:French male painters]]
[[Category:Artists who committed suicide]]
[[Category:People with Parkinson's disease]]
[[Category:1928 births]]
[[Category:1928 births]]
[[Category:1999 deaths]]
[[Category:1999 deaths]]
[[Category:1999 suicides]]
[[Category:20th-century French LGBTQ people]]
[[Category:20th-century French male artists]]
[[Category:20th-century French painters]]
[[Category:Artists who died by suicide]]
[[Category:Bisexual male artists]]
[[Category:Bisexual painters]]
[[Category:Bisexual sculptors]]
[[Category:École des Beaux-Arts alumni]]
[[Category:École des Beaux-Arts alumni]]
[[Category:French bisexual artists]]
[[Category:French bisexual men]]
[[Category:French LGBTQ painters]]
[[Category:French LGBTQ sculptors]]
[[Category:French male painters]]
[[Category:Members of the Académie des beaux-arts]]
[[Category:Members of the Académie des beaux-arts]]
[[Category:Painters who committed suicide]]
[[Category:People with Parkinson's disease]]
[[Category:Recipients of the Legion of Honour]]
[[Category:Recipients of the Legion of Honour]]
[[Category:French LGBT painters]]
[[Category:Suicides by asphyxiation]]
[[Category:French LGBT sculptors]]
[[Category:Suicides in France]]
[[Category:Bisexual painters]]
[[Category:Bisexual sculptors]]
[[Category:Bisexual men]]
[[Category:1999 suicides]]
[[Category:20th-century French LGBT people]]

Latest revision as of 07:30, 25 September 2024

Bernard Buffet
Bernard Buffet in his studio in Tourtour, France (1989) Credits: Danielle Buffet
Born(1928-07-10)10 July 1928
Paris, France
Died4 October 1999(1999-10-04) (aged 71)
Tourtour, France
EducationÉcole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Marie-Thérèse Auffray
Known forPainting, drawing, printmaking
MovementExpressionism
AwardsMember of the Salon d'Automne, 1947

Member of the Société des Artistes Indépendants, 1947
Prix de la Critique, 1948
Prix Puvis de Chavannes, 1950
Officer of the Légion d'Honneur,1973

Member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts, 1974
Signature

Bernard Buffet (French: [byfɛ]; 10 July 1928 – 4 October 1999) was a French painter, printmaker, and sculptor. An extremely prolific artist, he produced a varied and extensive body of work. His style was exclusively figurative and is often classified as Expressionist or "miserabilist".[1]

Buffet enjoyed worldwide popularity in the 1950s and was often compared to Pablo Picasso for his fame and talent. By the end of the 1950s, however, the public and art community turned strongly against him due to changing artistic tastes, Buffet's lavish lifestyle, and his extremely prolific output. The 21st century saw a renewed interest in his oeuvre.[1]

Early life

[edit]

Bernard Buffet was born in 1928 in Paris, where he spent his childhood.[1] He was from a middle-class family with roots in Northern and Western France. His mother often took him to the Louvre Museum, where he became familiar with the works of Realist painters, such as Gustave Courbet. This is likely to have influenced his style.[citation needed] In 1955, he painted a work that paid tribute to Courbet's Le Sommeil. [2]

Bernard Buffet was a student at the Lycée Carnot during the Nazi occupation of Paris. He travelled to drawings courses in the evenings despite the curfew imposed by the Nazi authorities. He then studied art at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts (National School of the Fine Arts)[3] and worked in the studio of the painter Eugène Narbonne. Among his classmates were Maurice Boitel and Louis Vuillermoz. He met the French painter Marie-Thérèse Auffray and was influenced by her work.[citation needed]

Buffet's mother, Blanche, died from breast cancer in 1945. Seventeen-year-old Buffet was devastated. Losing his mother at an early age remained a source of melancholy throughout his life.[citation needed]

Rise to fame

[edit]
Charles de Gaulle by Buffet

As a painter, Buffet produced religious pieces, landscapes, portraits and still-lifes. Influenced by Francis Gruber,[4][5] he often painted "Miserabilist" scenes of despair, including scenes of poverty and Holocaust victims, but he also portrayed subjects as varied as ashtrays, clowns, and table lamps.[1][6] His work was characterized by thick black lines, elongated forms, and a lack of depth of field.[1][6]

In 1946, he had his first painting shown, a self-portrait, at the Salon des Moins de Trente Ans at the Galerie Beaux-Arts. In 1948, he won his first major prize, the Prix de Critique, sharing it with fellow Expressionist Bernard Lorjou.[7]

An extremely prolific painter, he had at least one major exhibition every year. By the age 26, it was said that he had completed more paintings than Pierre-Auguste Renoir's lifetime output.[6] In 1948, gallerist Maurice Garnier began showing Buffet's work, and by 1977, his gallery was devoted solely to Buffet.[1]

By the age of 21, Buffet was already considered one of the greatest stars of the art world, frequently compared to Pablo Picasso.[3] A 1958 article in The New York Times called him one of the "Fabulous Five" cultural figures of post-war France (the other four were Brigitte Bardot, Françoise Sagan, Roger Vadim, and Yves Saint Laurent).[6]

Buffet illustrated "Les Chants de Maldoror" written by Comte de Lautréamont in 1952. In 1955, he was awarded the first prize by the magazine Connaissance des Arts, which named the ten best post-war artists. In 1958, at the age of 30, the first retrospective of his work was held at the Galerie Charpentier.

He was commissioned to make the portrait of Charles de Gaulle for the 1958 Time Man of the Year magazine cover.

Later career

[edit]

However, by the end of the 1950s, both the public and the art world had turned against Buffet. His lavish lifestyle--including a Rolls Royce with a chauffeur and a private castle in Provence[6]--made him seem out of touch with the still-struggling economy of post-war France, which he had memorably portrayed in his early paintings.[3][8] A 1956 magazine photograph of Buffet being helped into his car by the chauffeur was a particular turning point in the public's views of him.[1] Another magazine published photographs of Buffet's lifestyle--large castle, expensive furniture, well-fed dogs--alongside the miserable figures of his paintings to implicitly accuse him of hypocrisy.[7]

Picasso further worsened Buffet's reputation by publicly denigrating his work, and Buffet also attracted the enmity of novelist André Malraux, the powerful French Minister of Culture.[9] Finally, Buffet's critical reputation was also affected by his tremendous and sometimes indiscriminate output. In the 1990s, he claimed he had completed a painting a day for more than four decades. In the words of one art historian, many of these works were "unequivocally bad".[3]

Despite his reduced reputation, Bernard Buffet was named "Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur" in 1973. On 23 November 1973, the Bernard Buffet Museum was founded by Kiichiro Okano, a private collector in Surugadaira, Japan.[1]

At the request of the French postal administration in 1978, he designed a stamp depicting the Institut et le Pont des Arts – on this occasion the Post Museum arranged a retrospective of his works.[10]

Buffet created more than 8,000 paintings and many prints as well.

Personal life and death

[edit]

Buffet was bisexual, and his paintings have been noted for their homoerotic themes.[3] Industrialist Pierre Bergé was Buffet's live-in lover for eight years from 1950 to 1958, recalling later that the two were "never apart for a single day."[11] In 1958, Bergé left Buffet for Yves Saint Laurent.[9]

On 12 December 1958, Buffet married the writer and actress Annabel Schwob. They adopted three children.[12] Daughter Virginie was born in 1962; daughter Danielle, in 1963; and son Nicolas, in 1973.

Buffet died by suicide at his home in Tourtour, southern France, on 4 October 1999.[9] He was suffering from Parkinson's disease and was no longer able to work.[1] Police said that Buffet died after putting his head in a plastic bag attached around his neck with tape.[13]

Legacy

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In the 21st century, there has been a renewed spike in interest in the work of Buffet.[1] His work is particularly popular in Asia and former Soviet Union nations.[8] In 2016, Paris's Musée d’Art Moderne held a large retrospective of his work, the first held in France since his death, though its curator acknowledged that it was a risky exhibition given Buffet's lingering reputation as the "ultimate in bad taste".[1] Also in 2016, British author Nicholas Foulkes published Bernard Buffet: The Invention of the Modern Mega-Artist, in which he offers a biographical account of Buffet's life and work.[8]

Corresponding with this renewed interest, some of Buffet's work also saw rising appraisals in the early 21st century. In 2015, his painting Le Cri du Clown (1970) sold for 3.15 million Hong Kong dollars ($410,000 USD) in an auction in Hong Kong. That same year, Christie's auction house in London sold Buffet's Les Clowns Musiciens, le Saxophoniste (1991) for £1,022,500, which set the record for the highest-selling work by the artist.[1]

Awards

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References

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  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Lankarani, Nazanin (20 October 2016). "Buffet: A Life of Success, Rejection and Now a Celebration". The New York Times. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  2. ^ Buffet, Bernard (2016). Rétrospective Bernard Buffet. Paris: Paris musées. pp. 72–73. ISBN 978-2-7596-0331-2.
  3. ^ a b c d e Atlee, James (14 January 2016). "Bernard Buffet: the Invention of the Mega-artist by Nicholas Foulkes, book review: Paris prodigy turned pariah". The Independent. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  4. ^ "Francis Gruber". Art UK. Retrieved 1 August 2023.
  5. ^ "Francis Gruber". Berardo Collection Museum. Retrieved 1 August 2023.
  6. ^ a b c d e Smith, Roberta (5 October 1999). "Bernard Buffet, French Painter, Dies at 71". The New York Times. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  7. ^ a b Cornell, Kenneth. "The Buffet Enigma." Yale French Studies, no. 19/20, 1957, pp. 94–97. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/2930427. Accessed 4 Aug. 2023.
  8. ^ a b c Faloyin, Dipo (3 August 2023). "Q&A: Author Nick Foulkes on the Reinvention of painter Bernard Buffet". Newsweek. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  9. ^ a b c Lichfield, John (16 March 2009). "Bernard Buffet: Return of the 'poser'". The Independent. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  10. ^ Bernard Buffet Maler Painter Peintre (brochure), Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt, April 2008.
  11. ^ "The Bernard Buffet years". The Yves St Laurent Museum. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  12. ^ Elisabeth Sancey (interview with Nicholas Buffett). (17 October 2009). "Survivre à des parents terribles (Deuxième partie)". parismatch.com.
  13. ^ Friend, David (4 August 2023). "Forgotten French Artist Bernard Buffet Finally Gets a Re-appraisal". Vanity Fair. Retrieved 4 August 2023.
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