Eugène Girardet

Eugène Girardet
Portrait from the Album Mariani (1908)
Born	Eugène Alexis Girardet 31 May 1853 Paris, France
Died	5 May 1907 Paris, France
Nationality	French
Education	École des Beaux-arts, Paris; Studio of Jean-Léon Gérôme
Known for	Painter
Movement	Orientalist

Eugène Alexis Girardet (French pronunciation: [øʒɛn alɛksi ʒiʁaʁdɛ]; 31 May 1853 – 5 May 1907) was a French Orientalist painter of Swiss ancestry.

Biography

He came from a Swiss Huguenot family. His father was the engraver Paul Girardet. His siblings, Jules, Léon, Paul Armand, Théodore and Julia Antonine (1851–1921), all became artists. After learning engraving from his father, he studied at the École des Beaux-arts and in the studios of Jean-Léon Gérôme, who encouraged him to visit North Africa in 1874. He also spent some time in Spain.

In all, he made eight trips to Algeria after 1879 (some with Jules and Léon), especially to the south, around the oases of Biskra, El Kantara and Bou Saâda, where he worked with Étienne Dinet. In 1898, he visited Egypt and Palestine, producing many works depicting the lives of desert nomads. Unlike other Orientalists, he produced no harem scenes. Upon returning to France, he became a teacher at the Académie Julian.

He exhibited regularly at the Salon and with the Société des Peintres Orientalistes Français (of which he was one of the founding members), with major shows at the Exposition Universelle (1900), where he won a gold medal, and the Exposition Coloniale de Marseille of 1906. He also showed his works at the Glaspalast in Munich.

He was interred at the Père-Lachaise Cemetery. In addition to several museums in France, his works may be seen at the Dahesh Museum of Art and the National Museum of Fine Arts of Algiers, as well as at museums in Switzerland and New York City.

Selected paintings

• 
  Al-Azhar Mosque, Cairo
• 
  The Tailor
• 
  The Fruit Seller
• 
  Bedouins in the Desert
• 
  Passage to Bou Saâda

Further reading

• Marie Tripet: "Girardet, Eugène-Alexis". In: Carl Brun (Ed.): Schweizerisches Künstler-Lexikon. Vol.1: A–G. Huber & Co., Frauenfeld 1905, pg.582 (Online)
• "Girardet, Eugène". In: Ulrich Thieme, Fred. C. Willis (Eds.): Allgemeines Lexikon der Bildenden Künstler von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, Vol.14: Giddens–Gress. E. A. Seemann, Leipzig 1921, pg.165 (Online)
• (in German) Renate Treydel: Girardet, Eugène. In: Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon. Die Bildenden Künstler aller Zeiten und Völker (AKL). Band 55, Saur, München u. a. 2007, ISBN 978-3-598-22795-0, S. 185
• René Burnand, L'étonnante histoire des Girardet : artistes suisses (The Amazing Story of the Girardets...), La Baconnière, Neuchâtel, 1940, 299 p.
• Lynne Thornton, The Orientalists: Painter-Travellers (1828-1908), ACR Édition, Courbevoie (Paris), 1983, pgs.108-109, ISBN 2-86770-083-3

External links

• Biography and appreciation of Girardet, by Janet Whitmore @ Rehs Galleries.
• ArtNet: More works by Girardet
• "Girardet, Eugène-Alexis". SIKART Lexicon on art in Switzerland.
• Girardet, Eugène in German, French and Italian in the online Historical Dictionary of Switzerland.