Henri Fantin-Latour
1836-1904
Henri Fantin-Latour was a French Realist painter and lithographer. He is best known for his luxurious flower pieces, but he also painted several group portraits that are important historical documents and show his friendship with leading avant-garde artists. His work strongly influenced the symbolist movement of the late 19th Century.
Born Henri Jean Théodore Fantin-Latour in Grenoble, Rhône-Alpes, France, he studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Whistler brought attention to Fantin in England. “Homage to Delacroix” (Musée d’Orsay, Paris, 1864) shows Fantin-Latour himself, with Baudelaire, Manet, Whistler, and others grouped round a portrait of Delacroix; and A Studio at Batignolles (sometimes called Homage to Manet) (Musée d’Orsay, Paris, 1870) shows Monet, Renoir, and others in Manet’s studio.
In spite of his associations with such progressive artists, Fantin-Latour was a traditionalist in their execution, and his portraits particularly are in a precise, detailed style. Much of his later career was devoted to lithography. He greatly admired Richard Wagner and did imaginative lithographs illustrating his music and that of other Romantic composers. His ingenious lithographs demonstrate the music of the great classical composers.
In 1876, Henri Fantin-Latour married a fellow painter, Victoria Dubourg, after which he spent his summers on the country estate of his wife’s family at Buré, Orne in Basse-Normandie, where he died.
