Today I went to see an arresting exhibit at the Musee Grand Palais entitled - "Odilon Redon: Prince du Reves" (Prince of Dreams). Odilon Redon was a late 19th century painter and printmaker who was a leading figure in the European Symbolist movement. Highly influenced by the French painters Delacroix and Gustave Moreau, he sought to articulate his brooding and mystical inner life, drawing on Biblical imagery, the poetry of Edgar allen Poe and Gustave Flaubert as well as modern science, the realm of the subconscious, and Darwin's theory of evolution. He believed that forms could transcend their literal aesthetic appearance and reveal deeper realities about the human experience. Angels, demons, prehistoric humans, madmen and prophets haunt his canvases.
I spent the whole day at this vast exhibition - walked through it 3 times - he was so prolific. The guards at the museum were brutal and I couldn't get away with taking any photos, but here's a selection I found online.
Seeing Odilon Redon's body of work today was a breakthrough for me as an artist. In his visionary etchings, drawings, and paintings I saw the meeting place of the mind, body, and soul. In my life and work I am always trying to address the balance and harmony between passion and reason, darkness and light, death and resurrection, the life of the imagination and the realm of real forms.
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Location:Paris, France
Congrats on the trip! Awesome blog. Looks like you're loving it there so far. Thanks for including me on the e-mail and letting me know what's going on.
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