Henri Manguin

Born in 1874 in Paris, Henri Manguin belongs to the circle of the French Fauves and to that generation of artists who, around 1900, re-examined colour as an autonomous means of expression. From 1894 he studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Gustave Moreau’s studio, where he met, among others, Henri Matisse, Albert Marquet and Charles Camoin. After impressionist beginnings, Manguin developed colour-intensive yet balanced painting, characterised by southern light and clear compositions. A journey to Saint-Tropez, to which Paul Signac invited him in 1904, proved pivotal for his work. In the following year Manguin exhibited at the Salon d’Automne and was grouped with Matisse, Derain and Marquet as a Fauvist. His preferred subjects are nudes, interiors, still lifes and Mediterranean landscapes, in which a sensuous but never unsettled conception of colour and form is evident.