Edouard Vuillard

Jean-Édouard Vuillard, the son of a retired captain, spent his youth at Cuiseaux. In 1878, his family moved to Paris in modest circumstances. After his father's death in 1884, Vuillard received a scholarship to continue his education. In the Lycée Condorcet, Vuillard met Ker Xavier Roussel, also a future painter and Vuillard's future brother-in-law, Maurice Denis, musician Pierre Hermant, writer Pierre Véber and Lugné-Poë. On Roussel's advice, he refused a military career and entered the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, where he met Pierre Bonnard.

In 1885, Vuillard left the Lycée Condorcet and joined his closest friend Roussel at the studio of painter Diogène Maillart. There, Roussel and Vuillard received the rudiments of artistic training.

In 1888, Vuillard joined the Nabis and contributed to their exhibitions at the Gallery of Le Barc de Boutteville. Later he shared a studio with two other members of the Nabis, Pierre Bonnard and Maurice Denis. In the early 1890s he worked for the Théâtre de l'Oeuvre of Lugné-Poë designing settings and programs.

In 1898, Vuillard visited Venice and Florence. The following year he made a trip to London. Later he went to Milan, Venice and Spain. Vuillard also traveled in Brittany and Normandy.

In the 1890s, Vuillard met the brothers Alexandre and Thadée Natanson, the founders of the Revue Blanche, and in 1892 did on their advice his first decorations, "apartment frescoes," for the house of Mme Desmarais. Subsequently, he fulfilled many other commissions of this kind: in 1894 for Alexandre Natanson, in 1898 for Claude Anet, in 1908 for Bernstein, and in 1913 for Bernheim and for the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées. The last commissions he received date to 1937, at the Palais de Chaillot in Paris, with Bonnard, and 1939, at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, with Denis, Roussel and Chastel.

Vuillard first exhibited at the Salon des Indépendants of 1901 and at the Salon d'Automne in 1903.

In his paintings and decorative pieces Vuillard depicted mostly the interiors, streets and gardens. Marked by a gentle humor, they are executed in the delicate range on soft, blurred colors characteristic of his art. Living with his mother, a dressmaker, until the age of sixty, Vuillard was very familiar with interior and domestic spaces. Much of his art reflected this influence, largely decorative and often depicting very intricate patterns. Vuillard died in La Baule in 1940.