Journal de Montréal, VENDREDI 23 SEPTEMBRE 2016 20H08
5 expos à voir pour la rentrée.
VALENTIN DE BOULOGNE BEYOND CARAVAGGIO, AU METROPOLITANMUSEUM OF ART Du 7 octobre au 16 janvier
Valentin de
Boulogne, dit le Valentin (1591-1632), de son vrai nom Jean Valentin, est un
peintre français, un des plus talentueux et des plus illustres représentants du
courant des caravagesques.
Jean
Valentin est le fils d'un peintre verrier dont la famille était originaire de
Coulommiers, depuis 1489. Le nom de famille fait référence à la ville de
Boulogne-sur-Mer, au xviiie siècle il est identifié sous le nom de Moïse (ou
Moyse) Valentin, ainsi que Valentin de Coulommier. Il existe une confusion sur
la date de naissance, dans l'acte de décès il est mentionné être mort à l'âge
de 38 ans mais son acte de baptême a disparu.
Il est
présumé que Valentin s'est formé à la peinture dans l'atelier de son père avant
de se rendre à Paris ou Fontainebleau et suivit l'enseignement de Simon Vouet,
qu'il admirait et dont il s'inspira. Il partit ensuite pour l'Italie.
La première
trace de la présence de Valentin en Italie est mentionnée dans le stati d'anime
de 1620, alors qu'il vit dans la paroisse de Santa Maria del Popolo. Avant
cette date on ne peut que spéculer sur ses déplacements et ses activités.
Tout en
étudiant en Italie, Valentin fut sous l'influence du Caravage et de Bartolomeo
Manfredi. Peintre de scènes de genre et de tableau religieux, il fera sa
carrière essentiellement à Rome.
Courtesy
of wikipedia
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valentin_de_Boulogne?veaction=edit
Le
caravagisme, ou école caravagesque, est un courant pictural de la première moitié du xviie siècle.
Apparu à la
suite du travail du Caravage à la fin du xvie siècle, le caravagisme est
parfois assimilé à une forme de baroque romain face au classicisme des
Carrache. Cette idée est cependant à nuancer en raison des nombreuses similitudes
qui rapprochent ces deux écoles romaine et bolonaise. Ce courant ne doit pas
être décrit comme un groupe ou comme une école, car il ne constituait pas un
mouvement structuré, mais tout au plus une imitation, une influence de
l’Italie. Cette évolution intellectuelle se situe à mi-chemin entre
l’opposition à la rhétorique classique des Académies d’une part, et le brillant
enthousiasme illusionniste du baroque d’autre part.
Caractérisé
par la prédominance de scènes aux puissants contrastes de lumière et d'ombre
transcendées par la maîtrise virtuose du clair-obscur, il se constitue autour
du style du Caravage et de ses plus proches suiveurs, tel Bartolomeo Manfredi.
L’école caravagesque d'Utrecht constitue, quant à elle, un groupe séparé
Courtesy of wikipedia
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caravagisme
Œuvres
Valentin de Boulogne (before 3 January 1591 – 19 August 1632),
sometimes referred to as Le Valentin, was a French painter in the tenebrist
style.
Valentin was born in Coulommiers, France, where he was
baptised in the parish of Saint-Denys on 3 January 1591, making 1590 his likely
year of birth. The family name, also spelled Boullogne and Boulongne, appears
to originate from Boulogne-sur-Mer, a city in northern France in the colony of
Pas-de-Calais, though the family had dwelt at Coulommiers since at least 1489.
His father, also named Valentin, and his uncle Jean were both painters.
It can be presumed that Valentin would have first started
painting in his father's studio prior to moving to Paris or Fontainebleau, and
before leaving for Italy. The first specific mention of Valentin's being in
Italy is in the stati d'anime for 1620, when he was living in the parish of
Santa Maria del Popolo. Prior to that date his whereabouts and activities are
unknown.
While studying in Italy under Simon Vouet, Valentin was
under the influence of Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio and Bartolomeo
Manfredi.
Caravaggio used a "bold, naturalistic style, which
emphasized the common humanity of the apostles and martyrs, flattered the
aspirations of the Counter-Reformation Church, while his vivid chiaroscuro
enhanced both three-dimensionality and drama, as well as evoking the mystery of
the faith." Caravaggio "followed a militantly realist agenda,
rejecting both Mannerism and the classicizing naturalism" and "in the
first 30 years of the 17th century his naturalistic ambitions and revolutionary
artistic procedures attracted a large following from all over Europe.
Manfredi, also an Italian painter, was known throughout
Italy and beyond as Caravaggio's closest follower. In the dramatically lit
canvases of his later period Manfredi adopted a common theme from
Caravaggio—the tavern scene featuring ordinary people, even religious subjects,
whose figures are depicted close to the surface of the picture to involve the
viewer in the action.
While Caravaggio and Manfredi may have influenced the style
and themes that would become common in Valentin's work, Valentin would study
under Simon Vouet, a Frenchman. In his time, Vouet was considered a leading
French painter. Vouet's earliest work show the influence of Caravaggio, and use
dramatic contrasts of light with a restricted palette of blacks, browns whites.
Valentin had success with a type of composition invented by
Caravaggio in which fortune tellers, drinkers, or gamblers are grouped around a
table. Valentin himself was fond of carousing and fine wine; it is thought that
he died from a chill caught after bathing in a fountain following an evening of
smoking and drinking.[citation needed] His surviving body of work is made up of
around seventy-five paintings. Valentin's genius shows in the subtleness of psychological
expression and interplay among his characters, as well as in the refinement and
finesse of his painting technique.
Valentin's painting Fortune Teller with Soldiers depicts a
group of young soldiers, one of whom is mesmerized by the fortune teller who is
reading his palm. Behind the gypsy a shadowy figure looks at the viewer with
his finger to his lips in a conspiratorial gesture as he steals the fortune
teller's purse from her pocket. A small child is seen returning the favor by
picking his pockets. While one person's fortune is told, another's is being
stolen; and one thief falls victim to another.
Courtesy of wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valentin_de_Boulogne
