Édouard Chimot
Encyclopedia
Édouard Chimot was a French
artist
, illustrator
and editor
whose career reached its peak in the 1920s in Paris
, through the publication of fine quality art-printed books. As artist his own work occupies a characteristic place, but as editor also his role was extremely important in bringing together some of the outstanding talents of that distinctive period in French art and providing the commissions upon which the development of their work in a formal context occurred.
, Chimot studied under Jean-Baptiste Levert and Alexis Mossa at the École des Arts décoratifs in Nice
, and then under Pharaon de Winter at the Beaux-Arts, Lille. The course of his early career is unclear. He seems to have first exhibited in 1912, rather late at the age of 32, and perilously close to the outbreak of World War I
, which was to cause a four-year hiatus in his career, so that Chimot was 39 by the time he really made his mark on the Paris art world.
It seems possible that Chimot's late start as an artist was because he initially trained as an architect - the only evidence for this is an item on the internet from Fodor's guides, which credits Chimot with the design in 1903 of the Villa Lysis
in Capri
, for the dissolute Baron Jacques d'Adelswärd-Fersen
. He went to Paris at the start of the century and tried various occupations to gain a living, while continuing to draw at night. It was at this time that he bought an etching press and taught himself printmaking, in his rare free time.
In the years before the War Chimot had an atelier in Montmartre
, haunted by “jeunes et jolies femmes” who served as his models. His first exhibition of drawings, etchings, and monotypes was in 1912; this was a success, and earned him a commission to illustrate René Baudu’s text Les Après-midi de Montmartre with etchings of what André Warnod termed his “petites filles perdus” (little lost girls). Then came the long interruption of the First World War, during which Chimot was mobilized for nearly five years.
’s studio in the Boulevard de Rochechouart
. He already had the etchings for Les Après-midi de Montmartre. These were published in 1919, followed by La Montée aux enfers and Les Soirs d’opium by Maurice Magre, Le Fou by Aurele Partorni, L’Enfer by Henri Barbusse
, La Petite Jeanne pâle by Jean de Tinan
, and Mouki le Delaisse by André Cuel, all illustrated with original etchings between 1920 and 1922. In 1921 Chimot also founded a magazine, La Roseraie: Revue des Arts et des Lettres, published by the printer and publisher La Roseraie under Chimot’s artistic direction. This however ceased production after a single issue.
. Between 1923 and 1931, from his atelier in the rue Ampère, he oversaw the production of a wonderful array of books illustrated by such artists as Pierre Brissaud
, Edgar Chahine, Alméry Lobel-Riche, and Tsuguharu Foujita
. He reserved some choice texts for himself, including Les Chansons de Bilitis by Pierre Louÿs
(1925), Les Belles de nuit by Magre (1927), and Parallèlement by Paul Verlaine
(1931).
The crucial decade of his career was that between the end of World War I
and the Wall Street Crash. It was during this time of frivolity and excess that Édouard Chimot created the haunting and compelling images by which his name will endure. Not only was he editing an important list for Devambez, but he remained at the same time as director of Éditions de La Roseraie, while also pursuing his own artistic career.
In the 1920s, Édouard Chimot also made at least two films, L’Ornière
(1924, also known as Micheline Horn and as Sur le Chemin de Vrai) and Survivre (date unknown). During the glittering Jazz Age, Chimot was forming not just artistic but literary alliances, with writers such as the Surrealist
Gilbert Lély, who dedicated the first publication of Ne tue ton père qu’à bon escient to Chimot in 1929. On 23 October of that year, Édouard Chimot must have felt gloriously launched on his late-started career. At the age of 49, he was a significant figure in the Paris art world, a generous patron of his fellow artists, and himself an artist with a public hungry for his late-Symbolist nudes, “soumises à leurs passions mortelles et délicieuses”, as André Warnod put it.
The following day came the Wall Street Crash, which wiped out the market for fancy limited editions. When the last of the books in production for Devambez, Chimot’s own edition of Parallèlement, was published in 1931, the game was up. That year a monograph on Chimot by Maurice Rat was published, with a preface by Maurice Magre, in the series Les Artistes du livre, putting the full stop to the glory years of Édouard Chimot.
Chimot had fallen in love with Spain while researching the illustrations for his edition of La Femme et le Pantin by Pierre Louÿs
in 1928. In 1938, he and his wife Loulou (19 years his junior) took refuge from the war in the holiday house they had bought in Barcelona
. Hence Chimot’s publications during the Second World War all appeared in Barcelona, and mostly illustrate Spanish-language texts. Chimot died in Paris in 1959.
A bibliography of Chimot’s illustrated books was published in an edition of 200 copies in 1991.
French people
The French are a nation that share a common French culture and speak the French language as a mother tongue. Historically, the French population are descended from peoples of Celtic, Latin and Germanic origin, and are today a mixture of several ethnic groups...
artist
Artist
An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...
, illustrator
Illustrator
An Illustrator is a narrative artist who specializes in enhancing writing by providing a visual representation that corresponds to the content of the associated text...
and editor
Editing
Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible, and film media used to convey information through the processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate, and complete...
whose career reached its peak in the 1920s in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, through the publication of fine quality art-printed books. As artist his own work occupies a characteristic place, but as editor also his role was extremely important in bringing together some of the outstanding talents of that distinctive period in French art and providing the commissions upon which the development of their work in a formal context occurred.
Early career
Born in LilleLille
Lille is a city in northern France . It is the principal city of the Lille Métropole, the fourth-largest metropolitan area in the country behind those of Paris, Lyon and Marseille. Lille is situated on the Deûle River, near France's border with Belgium...
, Chimot studied under Jean-Baptiste Levert and Alexis Mossa at the École des Arts décoratifs in Nice
Nice
Nice is the fifth most populous city in France, after Paris, Marseille, Lyon and Toulouse, with a population of 348,721 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Nice extends beyond the administrative city limits with a population of more than 955,000 on an area of...
, and then under Pharaon de Winter at the Beaux-Arts, Lille. The course of his early career is unclear. He seems to have first exhibited in 1912, rather late at the age of 32, and perilously close to the outbreak of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, which was to cause a four-year hiatus in his career, so that Chimot was 39 by the time he really made his mark on the Paris art world.
It seems possible that Chimot's late start as an artist was because he initially trained as an architect - the only evidence for this is an item on the internet from Fodor's guides, which credits Chimot with the design in 1903 of the Villa Lysis
Villa Lysis
Villa Lysis — initially called La Gloriette, today also known as Villa Fersen — is a villa on Capri built by industrialist and poet Jacques d'Adelswärd-Fersen in 1905...
in Capri
Capri
Capri is an Italian island in the Tyrrhenian Sea off the Sorrentine Peninsula, on the south side of the Gulf of Naples, in the Campania region of Southern Italy...
, for the dissolute Baron Jacques d'Adelswärd-Fersen
Jacques d'Adelsward-Fersen
Baron Jacques d'Adelswärd-Fersen was a novelist and poet of the early 20th century; his modern fame is based on a mid-century fictionalised biography by Roger Peyrefitte....
. He went to Paris at the start of the century and tried various occupations to gain a living, while continuing to draw at night. It was at this time that he bought an etching press and taught himself printmaking, in his rare free time.
In the years before the War Chimot had an atelier in Montmartre
Montmartre
Montmartre is a hill which is 130 metres high, giving its name to the surrounding district, in the north of Paris in the 18th arrondissement, a part of the Right Bank. Montmartre is primarily known for the white-domed Basilica of the Sacré Cœur on its summit and as a nightclub district...
, haunted by “jeunes et jolies femmes” who served as his models. His first exhibition of drawings, etchings, and monotypes was in 1912; this was a success, and earned him a commission to illustrate René Baudu’s text Les Après-midi de Montmartre with etchings of what André Warnod termed his “petites filles perdus” (little lost girls). Then came the long interruption of the First World War, during which Chimot was mobilized for nearly five years.
A fresh start
After the war, Chimot rented RenoirRenoir
-People with the surname Renoir :* Pierre-Auguste Renoir , French painter* Pierre Renoir , French actor and son of Pierre-Auguste Renoir* Jean Renoir , French film director and son of Pierre-Auguste Renoir...
’s studio in the Boulevard de Rochechouart
Boulevard de Rochechouart
The Boulevard de Rochechouart is situated at the foot of Montmartre and to its south. Like the neighbouring street it is named after Marguerite de Rochechouart de Montpipeau , abbess of Montmartre. It is a result of the 1864 merging of the boulevards and chemins de ronde which followed the...
. He already had the etchings for Les Après-midi de Montmartre. These were published in 1919, followed by La Montée aux enfers and Les Soirs d’opium by Maurice Magre, Le Fou by Aurele Partorni, L’Enfer by Henri Barbusse
Henri Barbusse
Henri Barbusse was a French novelist and a member of the French Communist Party.-Life:...
, La Petite Jeanne pâle by Jean de Tinan
Jean de Tinan
Jean de Tinan, a.k.a. Jean Le Barbier de Tinan, was a French writer.-Biography:Born to a baron and a socialite, Jean de Tinan moved to Paris in 1895 after graduating from the School of Agriculture in Montpellier....
, and Mouki le Delaisse by André Cuel, all illustrated with original etchings between 1920 and 1922. In 1921 Chimot also founded a magazine, La Roseraie: Revue des Arts et des Lettres, published by the printer and publisher La Roseraie under Chimot’s artistic direction. This however ceased production after a single issue.
Devambez
This led to the breakthrough in Chimot's career by which he became artistic director of Les Éditions d’Art DevambezDevambez
Devambez is the name of a fine printer's firm in Paris. It operated under that name from 1873, when a printing business established by the royal engraver Hippolyte Brasseux in 1826 was acquired by Édouard Devambez. At first the firm specialized in heraldic engraving, engraved letterheads and...
. Between 1923 and 1931, from his atelier in the rue Ampère, he oversaw the production of a wonderful array of books illustrated by such artists as Pierre Brissaud
Pierre Brissaud
Pierre Brissaud was a French Art Deco illustrator, painter, and engraver whose father was Docteur Edouard Brissaud. He was born in Paris and trained at the École des Beaux-Arts and Atelier Fernand Cormon in Montmartre, Paris. His fellow Cormon students were his brother Jacques, André-Édouard...
, Edgar Chahine, Alméry Lobel-Riche, and Tsuguharu Foujita
Tsuguharu Foujita
was a painter and printmaker born in Tokyo, Japan who applied Japanese ink techniques to Western style paintings.- Education :In 1910 when he was twenty-four years old Foujita graduated from what is now the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music....
. He reserved some choice texts for himself, including Les Chansons de Bilitis by Pierre Louÿs
Pierre Louÿs
Pierre Louÿs was a French poet and writer, most renowned for lesbian and classical themes in some of his writings. He is known as a writer who "expressed pagan sensuality with stylistic perfection."-Life:...
(1925), Les Belles de nuit by Magre (1927), and Parallèlement by Paul Verlaine
Paul Verlaine
Paul-Marie Verlaine was a French poet associated with the Symbolist movement. He is considered one of the greatest representatives of the fin de siècle in international and French poetry.-Early life:...
(1931).
The crucial decade of his career was that between the end of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
and the Wall Street Crash. It was during this time of frivolity and excess that Édouard Chimot created the haunting and compelling images by which his name will endure. Not only was he editing an important list for Devambez, but he remained at the same time as director of Éditions de La Roseraie, while also pursuing his own artistic career.
In the 1920s, Édouard Chimot also made at least two films, L’Ornière
French films of 1924
A list of films produced in France in 1924:-1924:-External links:* at the Internet Movie Database**...
(1924, also known as Micheline Horn and as Sur le Chemin de Vrai) and Survivre (date unknown). During the glittering Jazz Age, Chimot was forming not just artistic but literary alliances, with writers such as the Surrealist
Surrealism
Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
Gilbert Lély, who dedicated the first publication of Ne tue ton père qu’à bon escient to Chimot in 1929. On 23 October of that year, Édouard Chimot must have felt gloriously launched on his late-started career. At the age of 49, he was a significant figure in the Paris art world, a generous patron of his fellow artists, and himself an artist with a public hungry for his late-Symbolist nudes, “soumises à leurs passions mortelles et délicieuses”, as André Warnod put it.
The following day came the Wall Street Crash, which wiped out the market for fancy limited editions. When the last of the books in production for Devambez, Chimot’s own edition of Parallèlement, was published in 1931, the game was up. That year a monograph on Chimot by Maurice Rat was published, with a preface by Maurice Magre, in the series Les Artistes du livre, putting the full stop to the glory years of Édouard Chimot.
Later career
Chimot’s work in the last three decades of his life shows a sad falling-off from his pinnacle of activity and achievement in the 20s, though inevitably in an artist so richly talented there are flashes of grace and brilliance. In the last year of his life appeared a collection of 16 drawings of female nudes, Les Belles que voilà : mes modèles de Montmartre à Séville, which he regarded as a summary of his lifelong devotion to the female nude. In the 1926 issue of L’Ami du Lettré (quoted by J.-L. Bernard: III), Chimot wrote,
“J’ai choisi la femme comme sujet préféré, puis unique de mon oeuvre. Je recherché un modèle au corps élegant et mince avec le côté moderne, un peu androgyne. Je fais beaucoup de dessins dans l’ambiance du texte, puis je choisis parmi eux. La gravure devient une traduction libre de mon dessin. Il me faut de deux à quatre semaines pour une gravure. Je ne fais que de l’eau-forte.”
Chimot had fallen in love with Spain while researching the illustrations for his edition of La Femme et le Pantin by Pierre Louÿs
Pierre Louÿs
Pierre Louÿs was a French poet and writer, most renowned for lesbian and classical themes in some of his writings. He is known as a writer who "expressed pagan sensuality with stylistic perfection."-Life:...
in 1928. In 1938, he and his wife Loulou (19 years his junior) took refuge from the war in the holiday house they had bought in Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...
. Hence Chimot’s publications during the Second World War all appeared in Barcelona, and mostly illustrate Spanish-language texts. Chimot died in Paris in 1959.
A bibliography of Chimot’s illustrated books was published in an edition of 200 copies in 1991.
Sources
- Anon. 'The Work of The Maison Devambez', Commercial Art Magazine, May 1928
- J. Bailly-Herzberg, L’Estampe en France 1830-1950 (Arts et Métiers Graphiques, 1985)
- E. Bénézit, Dictionnaire critique et documentaire des Peintres, Sculpteurs, Dessinateurs et Graveurs (Gründ, 14 vols, 1999)
- J.-L. Bernard, Édouard Chimot 1880-1959: bibliographie des oeuvres illustrés. (J-L Bernard, 1991)
- [Édouard Chimot], Les Éditions d’Art Devambez (Éditions d’Art Devambez, 1929)
- Colette Giraudon, Paul GuillaumePaul GuillaumePaul Guillaume was a French art dealer. Dealer of Chaim Soutine and Amedeo Modigliani, he was one of the first to organize African art exhibitions...
et les Peintres du XXe Siècle (La Bibliothèque des Arts, 1993) - Paul Guillaume, 'A New Aesthetic', Les Arts à Paris, 15 mai 1919
- Luc Monod, Manuel de l’Amateur de Livres Illustrés Modernes 1875-1975 (Ides et Calendes, 1992)
- Pierre Mornand, Trente Artistes du Livre (Éditions Marval, 1945)
- Pierre Mornand, Vingt-Deux Artistes du Livre (Courier Graphique, 1948)
- Pierre Mornand, Vingt Artistes du Livre (Courier Graphique, 1950)
- Marcus Osterwalder, Dictionnaire des Illustrateurs, 1800-1965 (Ides et Calendes, 3 vols, 2000)
- Maurice Rat, Édouard Chimot (Henri Babou, 1931)
- W.J. Strachan, The Artist and the Book in France (Peter Owen, 1969)
- Martin Wolpert and Jeffrey Winter, Figurative Paintings: Paris and the Modern Spirit (Schiffer, 2006)