Getty exhibition rains BLACK: For 19th Century French Artists, ‘Noir’ Was The New Black

The Eye, Like a Strange Balloon, Mounts toward Infinity, 1882, Odilon Redon, lithograph on chine collé. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Wallis Foundation Fund in memory of Hal B. Wallis. Image: www.lacma.org

The Eye, Like a Strange Balloon, Mounts toward Infinity, 1882, Odilon Redon, lithograph on chine collé. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Wallis Foundation Fund in memory of Hal B. Wallis. Image: www.lacma.org

For 19th Century French Artists, ‘Noir’ Was The New Black

 

In the 19th century, French artists started getting creative with black materials— chalk, pastels, crayons and charcoal — some of them newly available. Now, a show called Noir at the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles celebrates the dark….

….Artists reflected these shadowy changes. In 1827 Eugène Delacroix drew a demon — Goethe’s devil Mephistopheles. The lithograph shows him flying over a dark city, the incarnation of evil with his claw-like nails and his grinning leer….

Read more at NPR: HERE

See info at the Ghetty: Noir: The Romance of Black in 19th-Century French Drawings and Prints

 The Vampire, 1855, Charles Meryon, etching on laid paper. Courtesy of Richard A. Simms


The Vampire, 1855, Charles Meryon, etching on laid paper. Courtesy of Richard A. Simms

They Spruce Themselves Up, 1799, Francisco de Goya; etching, aquatint, burnished aquatint, drypoint, and burin on laid paper. The Norton Simon Art Foundation, Pasadena, California

They Spruce Themselves Up, 1799, Francisco de Goya; etching, aquatint, burnished aquatint, drypoint, and burin on laid paper. The Norton Simon Art Foundation, Pasadena, California

"A Way of Flying," 1864, by Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes, on view in "Noir: The Romance of Black" at the Getty Museum. (Pomona College Collection)

“A Way of Flying,” 1864, by Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes, on view in “Noir: The Romance of Black” at the Getty Museum. (Pomona College Collection)

The Eye, Like a Strange Balloon, Mounts toward Infinity, 1882, Odilon Redon, lithograph on chine collé. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Wallis Foundation Fund in memory of Hal B. Wallis. Image: www.lacma.org

The Eye, Like a Strange Balloon, Mounts toward Infinity, 1882, Odilon Redon, lithograph on chine collé. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Wallis Foundation Fund in memory of Hal B. Wallis. Image: www.lacma.org

 

Barry William Hale

One Comment

  1. Yes, saw this when I was in LA earlier this month and found it a wonderful exhibition. I suggest planning extra time for your visit, as the garden and grounds of the museum are also quite beautiful and offer fantastic views.

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