Redon

by Michael Gibson

Symbols and shadows: States of mind in pastel, charcoal and oil

"My drawings are not self-defining; they inspire. They determine nothing. Like music, they place us in the ambiguous world of the indeterminate."
Odilon Redon

A major Symbolist artist, Odilon Redon (1840-1916) was also a painter of scenic and emotional extremes. Until around 1890, he was renowned for work in black and white only. These Noirs in charcoal drawing or lithograph were composed not only of a somber palette, but also by fantastic, frightening figures. Gradually, the artist began to introduce colored pastel, and with it, new and lighter motifs. Flowers became a recurring preoccupation. Where symbols of melancholy once stood, horses and fluttering butterflies entered the scene.

While this latter-day lyricism and harmony contrasted sharply with Redon's earlier mood of melancholy, his guiding principle remained to place the visible at the service of the invisible. With his dream-like imagery, sumptuous textures, and suggestive use of color, Redon sought to create a pictorial equivalent to his own psyche. From foreboding to lightness, he was above all an artist of states of mind, with considerable influence on later Post-Impressionism.

About the series:
Each book in TASCHEN's Basic Art series features:
a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance
a concise biography
approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions

Genres: Art, Biography, Art History, Art and Photography, Nonfiction

95 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1995

Reviews

[JW van der Merwe · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author captured the development of Redon as a person as well as his art. In this series I enjoyed this book more than the others. Redon as a person I think apart from his dreamlike paintings i.e. the grandfather of surrealism, I think was very calculated in what he did. Some comments in the book are fascinating - "The merest sketch or scribble...in my portfolio took on a new sense. And that was the true date of my determination". I think he is one of the artists who started out dark (his black era) and moved towards the light and colours - exactly the same happened in his life and he ended not in poverty and as a well-known artist. This is material for a longer more exhaustive biography. This was a good read.

[YQ · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

[Janet Freedman · Rating 4 out of 5]

In school, my art history books illustrated discussions of Redon's work by showing us his many black and white pieces - works in charcoals and lithographs of some rather ghoulish subjects - eyeballs, heads without bodies, smiling giant spiders - little of which I found interesting or attractive. This book contains some of those works but also many of his later works, some of which are a rich explosion of color. His subjects were vases of flowers, portraits; mythological, literary and religious subjects. I especially enjoyed the works that grew more abstract - "Mysteries of the Sea", "Underwater Vision" and "Flowers Red Panel". The author discuses Redon's childhood (which may have been the source of his earlier black and white work) and his widening work up until his death in 1916.

[Sally · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is mostly just an art album with some biographical and interpretive text about the great Symbolist painter Redon, and it has the annoying tendency of a lot of these albums that the art on a given page will often have no connection with the text on it.

But SO PRETTY. SUCH ART. WOW.