Van Gogh •
Artist Biographies
•
Constantin Guys
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Constantin Guys |
| Birth Year : |
1802 |
| Death Year : |
1892 |
| Country : |
France |
Constantin Guys was born in Flessingen, Holland. He died, after a long and vagabond life, at the age of ninety in a
public institution in Paris, almost completely destitute. Very little positive information is available about Guys, other
than that he worked for the "Illustrated London News" until 1860, sending stories and drawings back to England from
Spain, Italy, Germany, Turkey, Egypt, and the Crimea. Guys was such a modest figure, that he did not think his drawings
valuable enough to sign, and he did not mind when quite ordinary wood engravers made second-rate cuts of them for
reproductions in print.
Upon his return to Paris, Guys continued to work in ink washes, retouched with strident yellow, raspberry pink, and
dark blue watercolors. Color enlivened
his sketches even as, in later years, it became more subtle. But color is less important to Guys' work than is his
lively line, his quick wit, and his
ability to portray the life of well-dressed people in fashionable pursuits. His lively, natural compositions are full of
light and shade, dynamic movement,
and freshness. His work forms a most valuable document of nineteenth-century life and, in spite of the fact that he
probably never painted in oils, link Guys to
Daumier,
to
Goya and, in his use of light and shade,
to
Rembrandt. Among Guys' first and greatest admirers
was Baudelaire, who wrote about him in the magazine "Le Figaro" (Dec. 18, 1863) and in his poetry. He was also
appreciated by
Monet, who enjoyed his modern approach to contemporary
scenes, his lightness of touch, and the sharpness of his draughtsmanship.
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