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Press Release
Pierre Bonnard
29 January – 13 May 2012
With the exhibition “Pierre Bonnard”, the Fondation Beyeler celebrates the great French
colorist and one of the most fascinating of modern artists. More than 60 paintings from
renowned museums and private collections provide insight into all phases of his career.
Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947) was a co-founder of an artist‘s group known as the Nabis, who
admired the style of Paul Gauguin and Japanese woodblock prints. In Paris, Bonnard
depicted the bustling life on the streets and in the cafés, before retiring first to Normandy,
very close to Monet‘s water-lily garden, then to the sunny Côte d‘Azur, where he was
inspired by the light and colors of the Mediterranean environment. Continually experimenting,
he produced variants in ever-new color combinations and from surprising points of view on
subjects from everyday life, in which time only apparently seems to stand still. The artist‘s
favorite model was the mysterious Marthe, his muse and wife. Bonnard created harmonious
still lifes, enigmatic interiors, intimate female nudes, moving self-portraits, and decorative
landscapes whose magnificent palette is unique in modern art.
One of the principal lenders is the Musée d'Orsay, Paris. Further outstanding loans come
from the Tate London; the Musée national d’Art moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris;
the Musée d'Art moderne de la Ville de Paris; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; the Metropolitan Museum, New York; the
Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.; the Kunstmuseum Basel; the Kunsthaus Zürich; and
from distinguished private collections, not least from the Hahnloser successors.
The exhibition was curated by Ulf Küster, Fondation Beyeler Curator.
The catalogue is published in German and English by Hatje Cantz Verlag, Ostfildern, It
contains essays by Evelyn Benesch, Andreas Beyer, Marina Ferretti Bocquillon, Michiko
Kono, Ulf Küster and Beate Söntgen, and a biography by Fiona Hesse. 176 pages, 121
illustrations, CHF 68, ISBN 978-3-905632-95-8 (English).
Press images available at: http://pressimages.fondationbeyeler.ch
Further information:
Catherine Schott, Head of Public Relations
Tel. + 41 (0)61 645 97 21, [email protected], www.fondationbeyeler.ch
Fondation Beyeler, Beyeler Museum AG, Baselstrasse 77, CH-4125 Riehen, Switzerland
Fondation Beyeler opening hours: 10.00 am to 6.00 pm, Wednesdays to 8.00 pm
Press Release
Pierre Bonnard
29 January – 13 May 2012
With the exhibition “Pierre Bonnard”, the Fondation Beyeler celebrates one of the most fascinating
of modern artists. With more than 60 paintings by the renowned French colorist on loan from
international museums and private collections, the show provides a fresh review of Bonnard's
oeuvre and development. It covers his entire career from his beginnings with the Nabis through
Symbolism and Impressionism to his ever more colorful and abstract late works. The paintings
depict familiar scenes with bathers, views of the artist's garden, everyday life, and the bustle of the
Paris streets.
Born in Fontenay aux Roses near Paris, Bonnard (1867–1947) worked principally in his private
residences and studio apartments in Paris. The main locations were his house "Ma Roulette" in
Vernnonet, Normandy (1912-39), and the villa "Le Bosquet" in Le Cannet on the Côte d'Azur
(1927-47) and their respective gardens. In these personal surroundings Bonnard found the scenes
and inspirations for his compositions in color as well as his preferred subjects, to which he
remained faithful throughout his life while varying them in different ways. Marthe, his lover and,
from 1925, his wife, was his favorite model. The wedding ended the ménage à trois among Marthe,
Bonnard and Renée Monchaty - the painter's model, muse and lover from 1918 onwards - who
reacted by taking her own life.
At the onset of the twentieth century, Bonnard practiced his own personal style, a "different
modernism" beyond all "isms" beholding to French classicism, and never questioned the centrality
of objectivity. Yet he broke through the traditional barriers between genres and developed them
further. He created unconventional still lifes that included human figures and animals. Landscapes
depicting "wild nature" stood in contrast to vibrant Parisian cityscapes. In his representations of
interiors he oscillated between intimate depictions of his wife at her toilette and views of their
bourgeois dining room.
The vitality of his often luminous palette soon set Bonnard off from the Impressionists. Turning
away from their attempts to capture the fleeting moment, he represented the permanence and
memorableness of things. With the aid of color composition, he lent his paintings an unusual sense
of space as perceived by the human eye rather than the camera lens. In the end, he was concerned to convey the whole range of sensory impressions through color.
If shortly after his death in the middle of the past century Bonnard was viewed as a representative
of a superficial harmony and an "innocent" chronicler of haute bourgeois life, ever since the 1984
travelling exhibition at the Centre Pompidou, Paris (which was also on view at the Zurich Kunsthaus), he has figured as an artist who captured the profound disquiet of a society destined to
vanish. By means of subtle aesthetic nuances, Bonnard delved beneath the ostensible harmony of
the day. This is seen in his color dissonances, interpenetrating spaces, ambiguous locations and
alogical figure placements.
In the exhibition, conceived as a "maison immaginaire de Bonnard," his paintings are grouped in
association with certain spaces that provided his favorite motifs: "La Rue," "La Salle à manger," "La
Salle de bains," "Le Miroir," "Intérieur – Extérieur," and "Le Jardin."
The exhibition opens with the room "La Rue." Bonnard painted Parisian street scenes especially in
his early phase. He repeatedly chose a busy traffic intersection in northwestern Paris not far from
his studio, as evidenced by two outstanding paintings of the same title - Place Clichy (1906-07 and
1912) - from a private collection and the Musée national d'Art moderne, Centre Pompidou, Paris.
The next room features depictions of Bonnard's "Salle à manger" with its very special atmosphere.
This dining room offered him many opportunities to cast an often humorous eye on the bourgeois
interior, as in the major painting Le Café (Coffee), 1915, from the Tate, London, and La Nappe
blanche (The White Tablecloth), 1925, from the Von der Heydt-Museum, Wuppertal. The dining
room still lifes mark a contrast with the intimate interiors of the bedrooms and bathrooms on view in
the room "La Salle de bains."
The nude was one of Bonnard's favorite motifs. The major examples on view here include
L'Homme et la Femme (Man and Woman), 1900, from the Musée d'Orsay, Paris. Depicting the
artist and his lover, Marthe, this early work marked a first transition point in Bonnard's oeuvre,
possessing a very modern-looking naturalness with which he left the stark simplifications of the
Nabi phase behind. Besides the other rooms in his house, Bonnard was particularly inspired by the
bathroom, from 1908 focusing increasingly on the subject of a woman at her toilette. An outstanding example, on account of its condensed spatial structure, is Le Cabinet de toilette (The Bathroom), 1932, from the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Bonnard's bathtub motifs are renowned.
A full five works in this genre are on view: La Source (Nu dans la baignoire), (The Source (Nude in
the Bathtub)), 1917, from a private collection; Baignoire (Le Bain), (The Bath), 1925, from the Tate;
Nu à la baignoire (Sortie du bain), (Nude by the Bathtub (Getting out of the Bath)), 1931, from the
Musée national d'Art moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; Nu dans le bain (Nu dans la
baignoire), (Nude in the Bath), 1936-38, from the Musée d'Art moderne de la Ville de Paris, and La
Grande Baignoire (Nu), (The Large Bathtub (Nude)),1937-39, from a private collection.
A further section comprises solely pictures with the mirror motif, which expands the pictorial space
and simultaneously questions it. Here, in addition to Le Cabinet de toilette au canapé rose (Nu à
contre-jour), (The Dressing Room with Pink Sofa (Nude in Contre-Jour)), 1908, from the Musées
Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels, we find two self-portraits made in front of the mirror
in the artist's bedroom: Autoportrait (Le Boxeur), (Selfportrait (The Boxer)), 1931, from the Musée
d'Orsay, and Portrait de l'artiste dans la glace du cabinet de toilette (Autoportrait), (Portrait of the
Artist in the Bathroom Mirror (Self-Portrait)), 1939-45, from the Musée national d'Art moderne,
Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris.
Then comes a room devoted to the important relationship between interior and exterior space in
Bonnard's art. Windows intrigued him throughout his career. His views through windows are
always recognizable as such, the outside world being clearly perceived from an interior point of
view. This leads to an integration of the environment in the interior realm, as seen to good effect in
Fenêtre ouverte sur la Seine (Vernon), (Open Window towards the Seine (Vernon)), 1911-12, from
the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Nice, and Grande salle à manger sur le jardin, (Dining Room on the
Garden), 1934-36, from the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York.
The exhibition also includes a rather large number of garden depictions from all phases of the
artist's career. After the turn of the century, nature advanced to become a key motif in Bonnard's
visual repertoire. In his eyes the garden represented an order in which the human relationship to
nature in general was reflected. In the early La Partie de croquet, (The Croquet Game), 1892, from
the Musée d'Orsay, the landscape still serves as a foil for an ornamental harmony. In his later
nature depictions Bonnard interlocked the landscape and garden with his house, as seen in the
famous painting Le Jardin sauvage (La Grande Terrasse), (The Wild Garden (The Large Terrace)),
1918, from the Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C., and Décor à Vernon (La Terrasse à Vernon),
(The Terrace at Vernon), 1920/39, from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
The "Pierre Bonnard" exhibition continues the Fondation Beyeler tradition of devoting exhibitions to
artists represented in our collection. Ernst Beyeler dealt in Bonnard works and in 1966 mounted a
Bonnard show in his gallery. With Le Dessert, (The Dessert), 1940, the Beyeler Collection
possesses one of the artist's major late still lifes.
One of the principal lenders is the Musée d'Orsay, Paris, with four significant works: apart from La
Partie de croquet, Autoportrait (Le Boxeur) and L'Homme et la Femme, already mentioned, the
museum is represented by La Symphonie pastorale (Campagne), (Pastoral Symphony (Landscape)),1916-20. Further outstanding loans come from the Tate, London; the Musée national d’Art
moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; the Musée d'Art moderne de la Ville de Paris; the
Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; the
Metropolitan Museum, New York; the Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.; the Kunstmuseum
Basel; the Kunsthaus Zürich; and from distinguished private collections, not least from the
Hahnloser successors.
The exhibition was curated by Ulf Küster, Fondation Beyeler Curator.
The catalogue is published in German and English by Hatje Cantz Verlag, Ostfildern, It contains
essays by Evelyn Benesch, Andreas Beyer, Marina Ferretti Bocquillon, Michiko Kono, Ulf Küster
and Beate Söntgen, and a biography by Fiona Hesse. 176 pages, 121 illustrations, CHF 68, ISBN
978-3-905632-95-8 (English).
Press images available at: http://pressimages.fondationbeyeler.ch
Further information:
Catherine Schott, Head of Public Relations
Tel. + 41 (0)61 645 97 21, [email protected], www.fondationbeyeler.ch
Fondation Beyeler, Beyeler Museum AG, Baselstrasse 77, CH-4125 Riehen, Switzerland
Fondation Beyeler opening hours: 10.00 am to 6.00 pm, Wednesdays to 8.00 pm
Pierre Bonnard
January 29 to May 13, 2012
01 Bonnard in the garden
George Besson, 1942
Photo: © Archives Besson, Besançon
02 Pierre Bonnard
Le Café, 1915
Coffee
Oil on canvas, 73 × 106.4 cm
Tate, presented by Sir Michael Sadler
through the Art Fund 1941
Photo: © 2012, Tate, London
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
03 Pierre Bonnard
La Partie de croquet, 1892
The Croquet Game
Oil on canvas, 130 × 162.5 cm
Musée d‘Orsay, Paris
Photo: © RMN, Musée d‘Orsay / Hervé Lewandowski
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
04 Pierre Bonnard
Place Clichy, 1906–07
Oil on canvas, 102.1 × 116.6 cm
Private collection
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
05 Pierre Bonnard
Le Cabinet de toilette au canapé rose
(Nu à contre-jour), 1908
The Dressing Room with Pink Sofa
(Nude in Contre-Jour)
Oil on canvas, 124.5 × 108 cm
Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels
Photo: © Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique,
Brussels /J. Geleyns / www.roscan.be
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
06 Pierre Bonnard
Fenêtre ouverte sur la Seine (Vernon), 1911–12
Open Window towards the Seine (Vernon)
Oil on canvas, 78 × 105.5 cm
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Nice
Photo: Muriel Anssens © Ville de Nice
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
07 Pierre Bonnard
Place Clichy, 1912
Oil on canvas, 138 × 203 cm
Musée national d‘Art moderne, Centre
Georges Pompidou, Paris,
Deposit at the Musée des Beaux-Arts et
d‘Archéologie, Besançon,
Donation Adèle and George Besson 1963
Photo: © Centre Pompidou / Musée National d’art
moderne / Charles Choffet / Musée des Beaux-Arts
et d’Archéologie, Besançon
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
08 Pierre Bonnard
La Symphonie pastorale (Campagne), 1916–1920
Pastoral Symphony (Landscape)
Oil on canvas, 130 × 160 cm
Musée d‘Orsay, Paris,
Donation Fondation Meyer 2009
Photo: © Musée d’Orsay, Dist. RMN / Patrice Schmidt
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
09 Pierre Bonnard
Décor à Vernon (La Terrasse à Vernon),
ca. 1920/1939
The Terrace at Vernon
Oil on canvas, 148 × 194.9 cm
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Gift of Florence J. Gould 1968
Photo: bpk / The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
10 Pierre Bonnard
La Nappe blanche, 1925
The White Tablecloth
Oil on canvas, 100 × 109 cm
Von der Heydt-Museum Wuppertal
Photo: Von der Heydt-Museum Wuppertal
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
11 Pierre Bonnard
Baignoire (Le Bain), 1925
The Bath
Oil on canvas, 86 × 120.6 cm
Tate, presented by Lord Ivor-Spencer-Churchill
through the Contemporary Art Society 1930
Photo: © 2012, Tate, London
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
12 Pierre Bonnard
La Table de travail, 1926/1937
Work Table
Oil on canvas, 121.9 × 91.4 cm
National Gallery of Art, Washington,
Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon 2006
Photo: Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
13 Pierre Bonnard
Autoportrait (Le Boxeur), 1931
Self-Portrait (The Boxer)
Oil on canvas, 54 × 74.3 cm
Musee d‘Orsay, Paris, Donation Philippe Meyer 2000
Photo: © RMN, Musée d‘Orsay / Michèle Bellot
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
14 Pierre Bonnard
Le Cabinet de toilette, 1932
The Bathroom
Oil on canvas, 121 × 118.2 cm
The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Florene May
Schoenborn Bequest 1996
Photo: © 2012, The Museum of Modern Art, New York /
Scala Florence
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
15 Pierre Bonnard
Grande Salle à manger sur le jardin, 1934–35
Dining Room on the Garden
Oil on canvas, 126.8 × 135.3 cm
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
Solomon R. Guggenheim Founding Collection, by gift
Photo: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
16 Pierre Bonnard
La Grande Baignoire (Nu), 1937–1939
The Large Bathtub (Nude)
Oil on canvas, 94 × 144 cm
Private collection
Photo: © Volker Naumann
© 2012, ProLitteris, Zurich
Press images http://pressimages.fondationbeyeler.ch
This visual material may be used for press purposes only. Reproduction is permitted for the duration of the exhibition only.
Please employ the captions as given and the relevant copyrights. We kindly request you to forward us a voucher copy.
For reproductions of RMN exceeding one-quarter page in size, compensation must be obtained from Mme. Jonquet (e-mail [email protected]).
Fondation Beyeler
Chronology
Pierre Bonnard (1867 – 1947)
1867 | Pierre Eugène Frédéric Bonnard is born on October 3 at Fontenay-aux-Roses on the southwest
periphery of Paris.
1885–88 | Studies at the Paris law faculty and attends courses at the Academie Julian. In 1887 is admitted
to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts.
1888 | Bonnard, Maurice Denis, Paul Sérusier, Henri-Gabriel Ibels, and Paul Ranson — inspired by the art
and ideas of Paul Gauguin — form an artists' group, calling themselves the “Nabis” (the Hebrew word for
“prophets”). Bonnard will remain affiliated with the group until its dissolution in 1900.
1890 | An exhibition of Japanese prints (Exposition de la Gravure japonaise ) impresses him deeply and
leaves its mark on his work, causing him to be referred to as “Pierre Bonnard, très japonard.”
1891 | Exhibits for the first time at the Salon des Indépendants and is acclaimed for his poster for FranceChampagne.
1893 | In Montmartre meets the 24-year-old Maria Boursin (1869–1942), who goes by the name of Marthe
de Méligny. She becomes his preferred model and his lifelong partner.
1896 | In January has his first solo exhibition, at the Galerie Durand-Ruel.
1905–10 | Pays several visits to museums in Belgium, The Netherlands, Britain, and Spain, often
accompanied by Edouard Vuillard.
1909 | First extended stay in the south of France.
1912 | Purchases the villa “Ma Roulotte” at Vernonnet, northwest of Paris. Henceforth he will pay regular
visits to Claude Monet at nearby Giverny.
1916 | In November accepts an invitation from his friends Hedy and Arthur Hahnloser to visit Winterthur,
Switzerland, where he contributes fifteen paintings to an exhibition of French art.
1924 | A major retrospective, comprising sixty-eight paintings dating from 1897 to 1922, takes place in
April at the Galerie Druet.
1925 | After thirty years of living together, Bonnard and Marthe marry on August 13.
1926 | Buys a villa, which he calls “Le Bosquet,” at Le Cannet.
1934 | Stays at several places on the English Channel.
1940 | Withdraws to Le Cannet and will not revisit Paris until the end of World War II.
1942 | On January 26 Marthe Bonnard dies as a result of her chronic tubercular lung disease.
1944–46 | His final years, which see a number of exhibitions and publications devoted to him, are very
productive.
1947 | Dies of laryngeal tuberculosis at Le Cannet on January 23.
Citations by Pierre Bonnard
"There are only a few people who see, really see, see everything."
"A work of art: a stopping of time."
“I do everything in my studio.”
"All art is composition - it's the key to everything."
“The presence of the object, the motif, is very disturbing to the artist at the time he is
painting. The point of departure for painting being an idea – if the object is there at the same
time of working, there is always a danger for the artist to allow himself to be too involved in
the incidences of the direct view, and in so doing to lose the initial idea.”
"A picture is a number of dabs of paint that come together to form a plane and finally
represent an object, the piece across which the eye roams without being arrested."
“I spend no more than two months a year in Paris. I come here to recapture the tone and to
compare my paintings with other paintings. In Paris I am a critic; I cannot work here: too
much noise, too much distraction. I know many painters get used to this life. For me, it's
always been difficult.”
“I have all my subjects to hand. I go and look at them. I make notes. Then I return home. And
before I paint I reflect and I dream.”
“I'm working hard, buried deeper and deeper in that old-fashioned passion for painting.
Perhaps I am, with a few others, one of its last survivors. The main thing is that I am not
bored.”
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