Giovanni Boldini

Jacques-Émile Blanche was born in Paris in 1861. His own origins were respectable and bourgeois; he was the son of an eminent pathologist and enjoyed an excellent cosmopolitan education. Blanche was brought up at Passy in a house once belonging to the Princesse de Lamballe. The elegant atmosphere of the home influenced his artistic taste due to its atmosphere of 18th century refinement.

Blanche studied with Gervex and Fernand Humbert, as well as spent time in studios of Manet and Degas. The quality of his flat surfaces, the precious grays and silvery light effect causes Jacques-Emile Blanche to be compared more with Manet, whom he admired, than with the Impressionists, with whom he was compared in terms of his early works. Nevertheless, his outdoor backgrounds with traces of vivid colors do have something in common with them.

Blanche's talents as a painter of still life, portraits, landscapes, beach scenes and the occasional incident from everyday life, earned him considerable wealth and a prominent place in the art world of his time. His friends and social acquaintances ranged from the avant-garde to the upper bourgeoisie and he moved with ease from one group to the other. His many portraits are evidence of the range of his connections and the broad recognition of his talent, including not only Jean Cocteau but others among the most famous French writers of the early years of the century. He acquired a great reputation as a portrait painter. His art is derived from French and English sources include: refined, elegant, and full of character.

From the early 1880s, he was a frequent visitor to London, where he worked with Whistler and Sickert. A regular exhibitor at the Salon of the National Society of Fine Arts from 1890, he also frequently exhibited in London at the Leicester Galleries and was given a monographic show at the National Gallery, a rare distinction for a living painter.

Blanche exhibited in Paris throughout his life, as well- winning a gold metal at the Exposition Legion d’Honneur in 1900 and the Salon des Tuleries in 1933. Blanche exhibited at the Salon from 1882 to 1889 and at the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts from 1890. In 1884, together with Ary Renan, he organized and exhibited at the first Salon des Indépendants at the Galerie Georges Petit in Paris. This was an eclectic show of Neo-Impressionist, Symbolist and other works.