Читать книгу Flowers - Victoria Charles - Страница 5

Vallayer-Coster was born in 1744 and participated with Chardin in the renewal of still life and bouquet painting in the 18th century. She did not become as well known as Chardin probably because she was a woman. She celebrated the glory of an elegant lifestyle. The velvet petals, the silk and her bouquet of flowers standing out against a neutral background, are immediately visually seductive due to the artist’s delicate and nervous strokes. Her roses and her jasmines seem to give off their voluptuous perfumes.

Flowers in a Vase

Auguste Renoir, c.1869

Oil on canvas, 64.9 × 54.2 cm

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

The flowers are often depicted surrounded by numerous and varied tactile materials: porcelain, bronze, wood, leather, marble or even a partly opened book (as if the act of reading has been interrupted). Although she was recognised as the painter for the aristocracy, she did not stop her artistic activity in the aftermath of the French Revolution. She died at the height of her acclaim at the beginning of the Restoration in 1818.

Vase of Camellias

François Lépagnez, 1870

Oil on canvas, 65 × 54.3 cm

Gallery Popoff, Private collection, Paris