FELIX VALOTTON (1865-1925),
Rhone Glacier / Rhonegletscher (3,600/2,500m -
Switzerland
In Glacier du Rhône, woodcut, 1892
Rhone Glacier / Rhonegletscher (3,600/2,500m -
Switzerland
In Glacier du Rhône, woodcut, 1892
About the work
Those very famous woodcuts and illustrations in black and white brings
to the young Swiss painter Felix Valotton an international fame. In
1891, he literally renewed the art of xylography following the
publication of an article by Albert Aurier, "Le Symbolisme en peinture",
calling for an "idealistic" and decorative art, from which would be
banished "Concrete truth, illusionism, trompe-l'oeil". The engravings
that Valotton show in 1892 made such a sensation that he was invited to
take part in various shows (Salon des artistes français, Salon des
indépendants, Salon d'automne).
The Glacier
The Rhône glacier (Rhonegletscher or Rottengletscher in German) is located at the north-eastern end of the canton of Valais in Switzerland. It gives birth to the Rhone, upstream of Gletsch, which flows then into the valley of Conches.
The Rhône glacier begins on the southwestern face of the Dammastock massif at an altitude of about 3,600 meters. The first 2,500 meters of the glacier consists of a firn, the Eggfirn, which undergoes a difference of 600 meters. At an altitude of 3,081 meters, the glacier is connected to the Trift Glacier by a small pass, the Undri Triftlimi. This other glacier flows north on the Bernese territory towards the Susten pass. The Rhône glacier then follows a gentler slope with a gradient of about 14% towards the south. It is bordered on the east by the Galenstock (3,586 m), and on the west by the Tieralplistock (3,383 m) and the Gärstenhörner Bar (3,189 m). The glacial tongue ends at an altitude of about 2,250 m1 and gives birth to the Rhone.
The Rhône glacier is one of the most studied glaciers in the Alps. In 1546, Sebastian Münster described it in his book Cosmographia Universalis5. The erratic blocks of the Swiss plateau with their imposing mass could not have been brought by the force of the water and it is this observation which pushed the scientists to take a closer interest in the alpine glaciers, thus establishing the bases of the glaciology. Louis Agassiz was one of the leading pioneers in the field and studied among others the Rhone glacier.
The first measurements on the Rhone glacier date back to 18746, thanks to the work of engineer Philipp Gosset. Since this year, the length, thickness of the ice and other observations are carefully recorded. Its thickness decreases annually by 25 centimeters.
The painter
Félix Edouard Vallotton was a Swiss/French painter and printmaker
associated (from 1892) with Les Nabis, a group of young artists that
included Pierre Bonnard, Ker-Xavier Roussel, Maurice Denis, and Edouard
Vuillard, with whom Vallotton was to form a lifelong friendship. During
the 1890s, when Vallotton was closely allied with the avant-garde, his
paintings reflected the style of his woodcuts, with flat areas of color,
hard edges, and simplification of detail. His subjects included genre
scenes, portraits and nudes. Examples of his Nabi style are the
deliberately awkward Bathers on a Summer Evening (1892–93), now in the
Kunsthaus Zurich, and the symbolist Moonlight (1895), in the Musée
d'Orsay, Paris.
Vallotton's paintings of the post-Nabi period found admirers, and were
generally respected for their truthfulness and their technical
qualities, but the severity of his style was frequently criticized.
Typical is the reaction of the critic who, writing in the March 23, 1910
issue of Neue Zurcher Zeitung, complained that Vallotton "paints like a
policeman, like someone whose job it is to catch forms and colors.
Everything creaks with an intolerable dryness ... the colors lack all
joyfulness."
In its uncompromising character his art prefigured the New Objectivity
that flourished in Germany during the 1920s, and has a further parallel
in the work of Edward Hopper.
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2019 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau
