Bernard Buffet
1928 – 1999
Bernard Buffet was a French painter of Expressionism and Member of the Anti-Abstract Art Group "L 'homme Témoin".
Buffet was born in Paris and studied art there at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts and worked in the studio of the painter Eugène Narbonne. Among his classmates were Maurice Boitel and Louis Vuillermoz.
Sustained by the picture-dealer Maurice Garnier, Buffet produced religious pieces, landscapes, portraits and still-lifes. In 1946, he had his first painting shown, a self-portrait, at the Salon des Moins de Trente Ans at the Galerie Beaux-Arts. He had at least one major exhibition every year. Buffet illustrated "Les Chants de Maldoror" written by Comte de Lautréamont in 1952. In 1955, he was awarded the first prize by the magazine Connaissance des arts, which named the 10 best post-war artists. In 1958, at the age of 30, the first retrospective of his work was held at the Galerie Charpentier.
In 1958 Buffet married the writer and actress Annabel Schwob. His first daughter Virginie was born in 1962, followed by Danielle in 1963. His son Nicolas was born in 1973, that same year he was named "Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur". One of Buffet's disciples, Jean Claude Gaugy, is considered the father of Linear Expressionism. In 1973 the Bernard Buffet Museum was inaugurated in Surugadaira, Japan.
At the request of the French postal administration in 1978, he designed a stamp depicting the Institut et le Pont des Arts - on this occasion the Post Museum arranged a retrospective of his works. In his lifetime Buffet created more than 8.000 paintings and many prints as well. He committed suicide at his home in Tourtour, Southern France, in October 1999 while was suffering from Parkinson's disease which left him unable to work.
Collections:
ARTAX, Düsseldorf
Boca Raton Museum of Art
Ca la Ghironda, Bologna
Kunstmuseum Walter, Augsburg
Musée d´art moderne de Lille, Villeneuve d´Ascq
Museum of Contemporary Art, Skopje
National Gallery for Foreign Art, Sofia
National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa
National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo
Tampere Art Museum
Tate Gallery, London
Awards:
1947 Member of the Salon d'Automne
1947 Member of the Société des Artistes Indépendants
1948 Prix de la Critique
1950 Prix Puvis de Chavannes
1955 First Prize by Magazine Connaissance
1973 Officer of the Légion d'Honneur
1974 Member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts