An anarchist, art critic, publisher, gallery director, collector, Félix Fénéon (1861-1944) was a major player in the artistic world at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. Through his work in favour of artists, his acquisitions, his criticism and his exhibitions, he...
An anarchist, art critic, publisher, gallery director, collector, Félix Fénéon (1861-1944) was a major player in the artistic world at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. Through his work in favour of artists, his acquisitions, his criticism and his exhibitions, he defended a decompartmentalized vision of creation at the time of the transition of art to modernity.
A passionate collector, Fénéon brings together a considerable number of African and Oceanian works that are displayed on its walls with paintings and drawings by contemporary artists, including Vallotton, Toulouse-Lautrec, Matisse, Bonnard and Braque.
In 1920, he published a survey on "distant arts", which questioned the status of so-called "primitive" sculptures and art objects. A promoter of neo-impressionism, Fénéon ardently supports the works of his pointillist friends, Seurat and Signac in particular.
A committed anarchist, he was also an active member of the circle of La Revue blanche before getting involved, in 1906, alongside the fauves and futurists, particularly in 1912, when, as artistic director of the Bernheim-Jeune gallery, he organized the first exhibition of futurists in Paris.
The relevance of this discreet man's eye and choices is shown through a selection of major works that he has loved, defended and collected throughout his life. It allows us to bring together different techniques, periods and continents in a vision that is faithful to Fénéon's borderless vision.
Exhibition "Félix Fénéon - Critique, collector, anarchist" Paris, musée du quai Branly - Jacques-Chirac from May 28 to September 29, 2019 /Paris, musée de l'Orangerie, from October 16, 2019 to 27 January 2020.
French language
288 pages, 250 illustrations
Rmn-Grand Palais / Musée d'Orsay et le musée du quai Branly Co-publishing
