THE UNKNOWN MONTICELLI

I

Harvest Festival

by Joan K. Yanni

Harvest Festival

 Unknown by most students of art and ignored by countless art historians, Adolphe-Joseph-Thomas Monticelli (1824–1886) is nevertheless an important bridge between the Romantics and the Impressionists.  His vibrant colors evolved from his admiration for the work of Delacroix, and his lush, impasto brushwork became an inspiration for van Gogh.

The Gallery’s painting by Monticelli, Harvest Festival (51.32), was completed toward the end of the artist’s life in 1883. Form and color seem to blend together in this picture of seven reclining women, their skirts making splashes of red, yellow and blue against the golden hills in the background. A man holding what appears to be a large bundle can be made out standing to their left, while 

silhouetted against the sky, a second man, on horseback with a riderless white horse at his side, watches them from behind. A man with a plough working behind two oxen seems to melt into the background of green grasses and brown earth, while a rider–on a bicycle?–emerges from the foliage on our right.

Monticelli was born in 1824 to Italian parents in Marseilles and spent most of his life there. His early years had been spent in happy freedom on a farm, and when he was finally sent to school his studies were a disaster.  He had always shown an aptitude for art, however, so his father reluctantly sent him to art school. But even art studies were not to his liking. Feeling his independence curbed by teachers in Marseilles, he traveled to Paris where he spent his days copying Old Masters at the Louvre.  He remained in Paris for two years, returning to Marseilles with an enthusiasm for the brilliant color that he saw in Venetian Renaissance painters, in the paintings of Watteau, and in the works of his older contemporary Delacroix.

By now he was a competent artist, but had yet to find his own style. He produced countless works, and he painted everything:  portraits, landscapes, seascapes, historical and genre scenes, even frescoes. He traveled and painted throughout southern and central France before returning to Paris in 1856.  Back in Paris he rented a studio close to the quarters occupied by the Barbizon landscape painter Narcisse Diaz, and the two became friends. They went on painting expeditions in the Forest of Fontainbleau together, where Diaz became his advisor as well as his companion. Diaz suggested that Monticelli avoid artificial arrangements and instead choose subjects from nature more suited to his skills. Diaz also encouraged him to use shorter, more spontaneous brush strokes and to liberate his sense of lavish color and texture.

In Paris Monticelli did not mix in artistic circles, did not show at the Salon, did not participate in exhibitions. He knew of the work of the Impressionists, but he had already experimented with the subdued colors and short brush strokes that they were using, so was not impressed by their work. He did mix in Parisian life, however.   It was the time of the Second Empire,  and interest in Rococo,  ballet,  opera and the theatre was at its height. Monticelli began to specialize in theatrical, brightly colored paintings of festive galas, showing elegantly dressed women and gentlemen enjoying festivities in the outdoors. The Empress Eugenie and her court were especially fascinating to him, and he undertook with pride a commission to paint four large panels for Eugenie’s rooms at the Tuileries. Other commissions came to him through dealers, and success was his for a time, but his art was stagnant.

The unexpected death of his father in 1868 brought him back to Marseilles where he went through a religious “awakening” and for a time thought of becoming a monk. He painted a large altarpiece for the church in Allauch, and perhaps realized that his mission in life was to paint rather than pray.  He returned to Paris once more, this time avoiding Parisian frivolity and living in a room in an eastern suburb of the city, completely absorbed in his work, and visiting Paris only to sell his pictures to dealers.

The Franco-Prussian War prompted his return to Marseilles, where he remained for the rest of his life and developed his mature style. He and Cézanne, whom he had known since the 1860s, often painted together around Aix and l’Estaque.  Although Monticelli made his living by painting portraits and still lifes that had to please the public, he was able to experiment with landscapes, using jewel-like colors and thicker textures.

His work was unique, with brilliant colors and impasto sometimes over half an inch high.  Instead of using a palette knife, he cut his brushes in half, leaving stiff bristles to apply paint and giving his works a quality of abstraction. He painted on panels of walnut or acacia, sometimes letting the wood show through for special effect. Local collectors and critics began to say that he was insane. Monticelli took criticism in stride and told friends that it would take 50 years for people to understand his work.

His mother’s death in 1883 was a shock from which he never recovered. His health declined and he began to drink heavily. He stubbornly continued to paint, though his best work was over. He died in 1886 after suffering a stroke.

Sometime in 1886 Vincent van Gogh discovered some of Monticelli’s works and began to model his own impasto technique and brilliant colors after it. Van Gogh always acknowledged his indebtedness to the Marseille painter, and, though always short of funds, he bought some of Monticelli’s paintings for his personal collection. In 1890 van Gogh and his brother Theo funded the publication of the first book about Monticelli, written by Paul Guignol, who had been a lifelong friend.

Sources:  Arthur Toothe & Sons, Ltd. London: A J.T. Monticelli; Paul Rosenberg & Company, Loan Exhibition of Paintings by Adolphe Monticelli, Grove Dictionary of Art; curatorial files.

N.B.: The frame on the painting was made especially for it by the Carrig-Rohane frame shop in Boston and dated 1928.  Honey was used as one of the ingredients to achieve the stippled gesso effect