LUCIEN LÉVY-DHURMER

French, 1865-1923

BIOGRAPHY
Lévy-Dhurmer, began his studies at the École Communale de Dessin et de Sculpture in Paris in 1879. In 1886 he met the artist Raphaël Collin, who helped and counseled him, as did the artists Vio and Wallet. He worked for a time as a decorator of luxury chinaware in Golfe-Juan and, after a journey to Italy, where he discovered classical art, he returned to Paris. 

 The artist “assumed the name Lévy-Dhurmer (formed by adding two syllables of his mother’s maiden name: Doldhurmer) in order to avoid being confused with another artist. An admirer of the Pre-Raphaelites, Lévy-Dhurmer in his own work combined an academic craft with Impressionist haze and idealized, Symbolist subjects. He was an instant success both with the general public and with other artists [and] praised by critics… He favored such subjects as shaggy heads of Beethoven, swooning women, or Salome greedily kissing the severed head of John the Baptist. Most of these figures are shown emerging out of a luminous haze” (Michael Gibson, The Symbolists, New York, 1988, pp. 181-2).

Although Lévy-Dhurmer “had not been instructed by Puvis de Chavannes or Gustave Moreau, he seemed to have much in common with those visionary 'painters of the soul' who had been exhibiting at the Salon de la Rose-Croix for several years: Edmond Aman-Jean, Louis Welden Hawkins, Henri Martin, Charles Maurin and Alphonse Osbert. Following the example of some of these artists, Lévy-Dhurmer admired Italian Renaissance art, evidence of which can be seen in pastels such as Woman with a Medal, Medusa, Circes and Florence. His translation of the Symbolist themes in the scores of Beethoven (Appassionata), Fauré or Debussy into different hues made him seem like a visionary, but his aesthetic seems to have changed to some extent after 1900, when his landscape painting became more prominent. In fact, only his presentantion and style changed. He continued to suggest feelings, interpretations and emotions but without relying on any traditional allegories. He became involved in the Intimist movement, along with Ernest Laurent, Charles Cottet, Henri le Sidaner and René Menard, whose pastels presaged the Classicism of the 1930s...

"He showed his works in individual exhibitions, notably in 1896 at the Galerie Georges Petit in Paris, which was a very successful exhibition and earned him admiration in artistic and literary circles alike. Several decades later the exhibition Autour de Lévy-Dhurmer at the Galeries du Grand Palais in Paris in 1973 revealed a tendency in art which had been largely unknown until then and which remained on the margins of the great innovative movements of the 20th century, but which was nonetheless of a quality which could not be ignored. Lévy-Dhurmer obtained a distinction from the Salon des Artistes Français in 1896 and a bronze medal at the 1900 Exposition Universelle in Paris. He became a Chevalier of the Légion d'Honneur in 1902.” [Benezit, Dictionnaire des Artistes, Paris, 2006, vol. 8, pp. 949-950.]

Museum Collections
Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Musée Basque et d’Histoire, Bayonne
Musée d’Art et d’Histoire du Judaïsme, Paris
Musée de l’Histoire de France, Versailles
Musée du Quai Branly, Paris
Musée des Beaux-Arts, Brest
Musée des Beaux-Arts, Quimper
Musée d’Ixelles, Brussels
Musée du Louvre, Paris
Musée d’Orsay, Paris
Musée du Petit Palais, Paris
National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC
Princeton Art Museum, Princeton, NJ
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC
Victoria and Albert Museum, London

Mark Murray Fine Paintings is a New York gallery specializing in buying and selling 19th century and early 20th century artwork. 

Please contact us if you are interested in selling your Lucien Lévy-Dhurmer, paintings or other artwork from the 19th century and early 20th century.

LUCIEN LÉVY-DHURMER
Paintings for sale