Bernard Buffet – Depart Pour La Peche

Description

Bernard Buffet, Depart Pour La Peche is an original drypoint engraving. This print is signed and annotated “E.A.” on the lower left margin. Printed by Atelier Lacouriere et Frelaut. Rheims 35.

“E.A.” stands for Epreuve d’Artiste or “Artist Proof”. Artist proofs are a small portion of printed impressions aside from the regular edition. The artist proofs are printed in a small number between 5 and 25 and can also be numbered and described in the catalogue raisonné.

Depart Pour La Peche exhibits Buffet’s signature style recognizable by thick, angular black lines that outlined his somber themes. He excelled in painting and drawing, winning prestigious prizes and attracting attention for his style of art. Buffet shows Paris itself, traditionally portrayed as lively and colorful, in a hard and lifeless manner. Although frequently viewed as heavy and foreboding, there is also a level of beauty in the work of Bernard Buffet. His style is defined by “dry” straight lines revealing the shape of buildings and bodies.

Embodying Jean-Paul Sartre’s Existentialism and Albert Camus’s Absurdism, Bernard Buffet’s painting conveyed the anxiety that permeated France during the Nazi occupation and came to dominate the post-war figurative art scene. A member of a group called L’Homme Témoin (The Witness) along with Bernard Lorjout and André Minaux, Buffet developed a realist style infused with social criticism, featuring a restrained palette and black outlines. He is best known for his grim “Horror of War” series and myriad streetscapes and interior scenes populated by angular, emotionless figures. Self-portraits, religious scenes, still lifes also figure among his oeuvre, which extends to lithography, engraving, and sculpture. While Buffet continued to enjoy success as a commercial artist until a debilitating illness prompted him to commit suicide, his work fell out of favor among critics in the 1960s and remains relatively unknown.