Montmartre - artists

(Later) famous artists of all kinds, maybe especially painters, were very present at Montmartre during the latter part of the 19th century and the first part of the 20th century. They lived of course a bit “everywhere”, moved often, but there are a number of spots, where you can talk about artist “colonies”.

During a short Montmartre walk, you would certainly pass by the “Bateau Lavoir”, which got its name by the building’s resemblance to the “laundry boats”, which you a century ago could find along the Seine River. The building, which offered a number of artist workshops, burnt almost completely down in the 1970’s, but a few workshops survived and new, far more comfortable ones, can now be found behind the white wall.  Among the more famous artists who lived and / or worked here you may mention painters like Picasso (the cubism – “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon” – was “invented" here), Modigliani, Juan Gris, van Dongen, Braque, Matisse … and authors like Appolinaire, Max Jacob, Gertrude Stein…

Also quite centrally are the buildings which now have become the Montmartre Museum, on which I have posted a number of times (the most recent one a week ago), where Renoir, Emile Bernard, Suzanne Valadon, Maurice Utrillo, Raoul Dufy… were active.

More on the western and northern slopes of Montmartre, there are other locations with a high presence of artists, like the “Villa des Arts”, on which I already posted. Renoir, who moved a lot, was also here for some time, as well as Cézanne, Signac, Picabia… 

Another one of these more excentric artist “colonies” on which I would like to concentrate today is “Les Fusains” (which can be translated as “charcoals”). The main entrance is today on a steep street, rue Tourlaque, but it covers an area with other entrances from the parallel street. Unfortunately I could not use any of those, so I have only outside pictures. However, I found an ad about a flat to rent with some illustrations from the inner courtyards, which I “stole” ‘(see “map” below), and also a post by a fellow blogger, “BBONTHEBRINK”, which shows what I would have liked to see. From my “map” with a Google Earth picture one gets an idea of the great number of workshops, about 30. Most of these buildings were created around 1900 by using material from the 1889 World Exhibition, some were added later.

A little comparison of the street in 1875, when "Les Fusains" were not yet there, and today.

Below, you can see some of the artists who have had their workshops at "Les Fusains". Renoir – again - was obviously more or less here already before, using an old shanty as workshop. His portrait of Julie Manet (1894), Manet’s niece, dates from this period. I tried to find photos and works which correspond to the time these artists lived and /or worked here for shorter or longer periods, basically from the very beginning of the 20^th century to before WWII. The portrait of André Derain is by Vlaminck. Bonnard is a self-portrait. There are still artists around… maybe someone will post about them in a few decades. 

Walking up the street, on a corner, is a building, where Toulouse-Lautrec, now and then lived and had his workshop 1886-97 (his 22^nd to his 33^rd year), his most active Montmartre-period. You can below see his paintings of Suzanne Valadon (with a hangover), who was his mistress for about two years, and of “La Goulue”, the first cancan-dancer. I guess it was when he left this place for another workshop that he left 87 works behind, which the next owner used as wallpapers.  He died four years later, in 1901, at the age of 37. (Correction, he lived and worked for a while in the white neighbour building, not the red brick one. Sorry!)

So these places, with the exception of the Montmartre Museum are still active artist places. … and then I must mention another one, “La Cité Montmartre aux Artistes”, which still is very active with some 180 workshops, actually Europe’s most important artist workshop centre. It was created in the 1930’s by the same architect who remodeled “Moulin Rouge” to what it is today (Adolphe Thiers). If you live on the bottom floor, you may have a garden, if you live on the top floors, you have a splendid view of Sacré Coeur.