
Pierre Bonnard Painting Reproductions Gallery 1 of 3
1867-1947French Nabi Painter
Pierre Bonnard (October 3, 1867 - January 23, 1947) was a French painter and printmaker, a founding member of Les Nabis.
Bonnard was born in Fontenay-aux-Roses. He led a happy and careless youth as the son of a prominent official of the French Ministry of War. At the insistence of his father, Bonnard studied law, graduating and practising as a barrister briefly. However, he had also attended art classes on the side, and soon decided to become an artist.
In 1891 he met Toulouse-Lautrec and began showing his work at the annual exhibition of the Societe des Artistes Independants. His first show was at the Galerie Durand-Ruel in 1896.
In his twenties he was a part of Les Nabis, a group of young artists committed to creating work of symbolic and spiritual nature. Other Nabis include Edouard Vuillard and Maurice Denis. He left Paris in 1910 for the south of France.
Bonnard is known for his intense use of color, especially via areas built with small brushmarks and close values. His often complex compositions typically of sunlit interiors of rooms and gardens populated with friends and family members are both narrative and autobiographical. His wife Marthe was an ever-present subject over the course of several decades. She is seen seated at the kitchen table, with the remnants of a meal; or nude, as in a series of paintings where she reclines in the bathtub. He also painted several self-portraits, landscapes, and many still lifes which usually depict flowers and fruit.
Bonnard did not paint from life but rather drew his subject sometimes photographing it as well and made notes on the colors. He then painted the canvas in his studio from his notes.
In 1938 there was a major exhibition of his work along with Vuillard's at the Art Institute of Chicago. He finished his last painting, The Almond Tree in Flower, a week before his death in Le Cannet, on the French Riviera, in 1947. The Museum of Modern Art in New York City organized a posthumous retrospective of Bonnard's work in 1948, although originally it was meant to be a celebration of the artist's eightieth birthday.
Two major exhibitions of Bonnard's work took place in 1998: February through May at the Tate Gallery in London, and from June through October at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.
50 Paintings of Pierre Bonnard
The State Hermitage Museum St. Petersburg Russia
Morning in Paris
$464
$47.90
Private Collection
A Dish and a Basket of Fruit
$275
Private Collection
The Small Window (La Petite fenetre)
$282
Private Collection
Door Opening onto the Garden
$496
Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco California USA
Landscape
$267
The State Hermitage Museum St. Petersburg Russia
Evening in Paris
$504
$47.90
The State Hermitage Museum St. Petersburg Russia
Train and Bardes (Landscape with a Goods Train)
$464
The State Hermitage Museum St. Petersburg Russia
Early Spring. Little Fauns
$540
$59.27
The State Hermitage Museum St. Petersburg Russia
Behind the Fence
$172
$47.90
The State Hermitage Museum St. Petersburg Russia
Dauphine Landscape
$289
National Gallery of Art Washington USA
Two Dogs in a Deserted Street
$134
$47.90
National Gallery of Art Washington USA
Table Set in a Garden
$298
National Gallery of Art Washington USA
The Letter
$352
$62.70
Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts Moscow Russia
The Bathroom Mirror
$458
Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts Moscow Russia
Summer, the Dance
$548
Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts Moscow Russia
Summer in Normandy
$464
National Gallery of Art Washington USA
Stairs in the Artist's Garden
$334
National Gallery of Art Washington USA
Bouquet of Flowers
$282
$48.31
The State Hermitage Museum St. Petersburg Russia
The Mediterranean. Triptych - Left Part
$379
The State Hermitage Museum St. Petersburg Russia
The Mediterranean. Triptych - Central Part
$379
The State Hermitage Museum St. Petersburg Russia
The Mediterranean. Triptych - Right Part
$379
Kunstmuseum Winterthur Switzerland
The Coffee Mill
$289
The Clark Art Institute Massachusetts USA
Women with Dog
$250
$47.90