NARRATOR:
In a simplified landscape dominated by vibrant reds and oranges, three young women in traditional Breton dress ceremoniously gather chestnuts. The even rhythm of the huge flat leaves and round chestnuts creates a flat, decorative pattern that recalls medieval tapestries. Repetition and simplicity empower the image, evoking a mood of tranquil beauty.
In the mid 1890s, when this painting was made, the traditional distinction between the visual and the decorative arts was beginning to break down. One contemporary artist proclaimed:
PAINTER [ACTOR]:
“Away with easel pictures! No more perspective! The wall must remain a plain surface and must not be broken by the presentation of limitless horizons. There are no paintings, but only decorations.”
NARRATOR:
Many avant-garde artists favored the production of large-scale decorative works, intended for private homes. Chestnut Gatherers is one of four panels representing the four seasons, executed by Georges Lacombe for the sitting room of his future mother-in-law. Here, you see autumn—summer and winter are now lost; spring is at a museum in Geneva.
Lacombe was a member of the Nabis, a group of young painters who challenged tradition by radically flattening pictorial space, using dark outlines and patches of bold color.
In November 1893 he first saw the work of Paul Gauguin, who experimented with carving wood and whose experiments in color and form would inspire many of the Nabis. Following in Gauguin’s footsteps, Lacombe would later work exclusively in sculpture. He is now commonly known as the “sculptor Nabi.”
Autumn: The Chestnut Gatherers
1894
Georges Lacombe (French, 1868-1916)
On View
Like Sérusier, Vuillard, and Denis, Lacombe was a member of the Nabi brotherhood, a group of artists who drew inspiration from Gauguin and the Synthetists, producing pictures organized around the abstract principles of pattern, color, and surface. This large canvas was meant to represent autumn in a never-completed suite of the seasons destined for the home of the artist’s mother-in-law. The repeating pattern of fallen chestnuts and golden leaves creates an almost musical rhythm, complemented by the dance-like movements of the gatherers, arranged in a graceful frieze. The Nabis increasingly regarded large-scale decorative painting as the highest calling of art.
Details
- Artist Name: Georges Lacombe (French, 1868-1916)
- Title: Autumn: The Chestnut Gatherers
- Date: 1894
- Medium: Oil on canvas
- Dimensions: 60-1/8 x 93-1/8 in. (152.7 x 236.5 cm)
- Credit Line: Norton Simon Art Foundation
- Accession Number: M.1979.35.P
- Copyright: © Norton Simon Art Foundation
Object Information
Gabrielle Questroy Wenger (Lacombe’s future mother-in-law), Versailles, 1894;
Lucien Besnard (d. 1955), Aleçon, by inheritance to;
Mme. Sanlaville (née Besnard);
Mmes. Sylvie Mora and Maldan-Lacombe by 1966.
[Oscar Ghez/Modern Art Foundation, Geneva, by 1966 (sale, London, Sotheby’s, 4 July 1979, lot 231, ill., as Les Ramasseuses de Marrons, to)];
Norton Simon Art Foundation.
Lucien Besnard (d. 1955), Aleçon, by inheritance to;
Mme. Sanlaville (née Besnard);
Mmes. Sylvie Mora and Maldan-Lacombe by 1966.
[Oscar Ghez/Modern Art Foundation, Geneva, by 1966 (sale, London, Sotheby’s, 4 July 1979, lot 231, ill., as Les Ramasseuses de Marrons, to)];
Norton Simon Art Foundation.
Les indépendants à Belle Epoque. Rétrospective 1895-1901
- Paris, 1966 to 1966
60 Maîtres de Montmartre à Monparnasse, de Renoir à Chagall
- Paris, Musée Galliera, 1966 to 1966
L'Aube du XXe siècle de Renoir a Chagall
- Geneva, Petit Palais, 1968 to 1968
Gustave Moreau et le Symbolisme
- Geneva, Petit Palais, 1977 to 1977
The Nabis
- Norton Simon Museum, 1992-09-24 to 1993-07-18
Reinstallation of South Wing
- Norton Simon Museum, 1993-10-07 to 1995-08-13
- Art-Loisirs,
- Joly, G., L'Aurore, 1966,
- Art-Loisirs, 1966,
- Hazanm, F., Dictionaire universel de l'art et des artistes, 1967, p. 343
- Huyghe, René, L'art et le monde moderne, 1969, p. 133
- Masterpieces from the Norton Simon Museum, 1989, p. 170
- Frèches-Thory, Claire; and Antoine Terrasse, The Nabis: Bonnard, Vuillard, and Their Circle, 1991, p. 151
- Salmon Blandine; and Olivier Meslay, Georges Lacombe: Sculptures, Peintures, Dessins, 1991, p. 46
- Hutton, J. G., Neo-Impressionism and the Search for Solid Ground, 1994, p. 167
- Ansieau, Jöelle, Georges Lacombe 1868-1916: Catalogue Raisonné, 1998, pp. 11, 69-71
- Musee Lambinet, Versailles, artistic life, literary and worldly, 1889-1939, 2003, pp. 98-99, 115
- Brettell, Richard R. and Stephen F. Eisenman, Nineteenth-Century Art in the Norton Simon Museum, volume 1, 2006,
- Campbell, Sara, Collector Without Walls: Norton Simon and His Hunt for the Best, 2010, cat. 1617 p. 427
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