James Tissot / Melissa E. Buron with Krystyna Matyjaszkiewicz ; and Donato Esposito, Marine Kisiel, Sarah Kleiner, Nancy Rose Marshall, Paul Perrin, Cyrille Sciama, Bertrand Tillier ; and Jan Dirk Baetens, Justine De Young, Margaretta S. Frederick, Charlotte Gere, Frédéric Mantion, Valentine Robert, Léa Saint-Raymond, Françoise Tétart-Vittu, Peter Trippi.
Publication
San Francisco, CA : de Young, Legion of Honor, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco ; Munich ; New York : DelMonico Books·Prestel, [2019]
"Born in Nantes, France, James Tissot trained in Paris at the École des Beaux-Arts. His mature career spanned both sides of the English Channel, where he garnered commercial and critical success. Despite recognition from patrons and peers, his reputation suffered posthumously. The critic John Ruskin's perception that Tissot created "unhappy mere color photographs of vulgar society" persists, and the artist is still too often classified as a painter of pretty women and fancy society portraits. However, scholarship demonstrates that even Tissot's most frothy society paintings reveal rich and complex commentary on Victorian culture. Tissot consistently defied convention in both his professional and personal life. This catalogue explores his multifaceted career with a fresh perspective and original scholarship to question where and how he should be situated in narratives of the nineteenth-century canon. Although he featured prominently in the recent Impressionism, Fashion, and Modernity exhibition of 2012-2013 (Musée d'Orsay, Paris; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Art Institute of Chicago), Tissot did not formally belong to the Impressionist circle and never exhibited in the group's shows, despite invitations from Edgar Degas. Tissot's long association with Degas is a major thread in the catalogue: he frequently acted as Degas's mentor in the 1860s and early 1870s, and they shared an extended series of correspondence. The portrait James-Jacques-Joseph Tissot (1836-1902), painted around 1867-1868 (Metropolitan Museum of Art) by Degas, remains an iconic image of the urbane artist as a refined gentleman"--
Includes bibliographical references (pages 306-315) and index.
Language (note)
Text in English, with translations from the French.
Exhibitions (note)
Issued in connection with the exhibition James Tissot: Fashion and Faith, held Oct. 12, 2019-Feb. 9, 2020, Legion of Honor, San Francisco, and Mar. 23-July 19, 2020, Musée d'Orsay, Paris.
Contents
Foreword / Thomas P. Campbell, Laurence Des Cars -- Donors and Lenders -- Introduction: the Mysterious World of James Tissot / Melissa E. Buron -- Essays. -- James Tissot's Youth in Nantes / Cyrille Sciama -- 'One gram of Henri Leys, two grams of talent, zero grams of genius': Tissot's Early Paintings / Jan Dirk Baetens -- 'Love, Error, and Repentance': The Faust and Marguerite Paintings / Margaretta S. Frederick -- Tissot and the Traumas of the 'Terrible Year' / Bertrand Tillier -- Tissot and the French Market / Léa Saint-Raymond -- Looking Beyond Paris: Tissot's Reception in England during the 1860s / Peter Trippi -- Tissot's British Modern-Life Paintings / Nancy Rose Marshall -- Tissot's 'Genius' Picture-Selling in Britain / Krystyna Matyjaszkiewicz -- Tissot's Houses in Saint John's Wood, London -- Charlotte Gere -- The Career of a Portrait Painter / Paul Perrin -- Tissot and Fashion / Justine de Young -- A Summer Dress with Yellow Ribbons / Franc̦ois Tétart-Vittu -- The Visions of Tissot / Melissa E. Buron -- The Resurrection of Painting: Tissot and Cinema / Valentine Robert -- Final Years at the Builon Estates / Frédéric Mantion -- Catalogue. -- Introduction to the Catalogue / Melissa E. Buron with Krystyna Matyjaszkiewicz -- Medieval and Modern Life -- Portraits -- Japonisme and Chioisie -- Vanity Fair -- By the Water -- La Mystérieuse -- La Femme à Paris -- 'Twixt Two Worlds -- Appendices. -- 'All are clever, several are hideous': Tissot and His Prints in London / Donato Esposito -- 'Always in search of the exquisite in art': Tissot's Cloisonné Enamels / Krystyna Matyjaskiewicz -- Tissot's Painting Techniques / Sarah Kleiner -- Pigment Analysis -- Tissot and Degas: Contours of a Friendship / Marine Kisiel.