Henry Lerolle (1848-1929), peintre naturaliste et chrétien

Abstract

Henry Lerolle (1848-1929) : naturalist and Christian painter. Henry Lerolle, a naturalist painter and a friend of Maurice Denis, developed a religious way of painting from the 1870s until the beginning of the 20lh century, which is at the same time characteristic of the naturalistic movement at the end of 19th century and revealing of a personal evolution which manifests itself with the painting exposed at the Salon in 1885, A l’orgue, conserved at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. This evolution, which demonstrates the complexity of his work, is probably linked to his friendships in the impressionist milieu as well as to his activities as a collector. His admiration for Degas and Puvis de Chavannes is certainly in the origin of his taste for the synthesis and decentred compositions, where a singularity is expressed by the emptiness, not very different from Lerolle’s preferences for music.