Biografie von Alexis Jean FOURNIER (1865-1948)

Birth place: St. Paul, MN

Death place: East Aurora, NY

Addresses: South Bend, IN; East Aurora, NY, 1903 on

Profession: Painter, writer, lecturer, teacher

Studied: Minneapolis Sch. Art with D. Volk, 1880s; Minneapolis Sch. of Fine Arts, 1886; Académie Julian, Paris with J. P. Laurens and B. Constant, 1894; also with Henri Harpignies, J. Blancet, and G. Courtois in Paris

Exhibited: World's Columbian Expo, Chicago, 1893 (a panorama of SW cliff dwellers); Paris Salon, 1894-95; Crystal Palace, London, 1895; NAD, 1895-97; Am. Art Assn., Paris, 1898-1901; PAFA, 1902-04, 1913; Corcoran Gal., 1908; Buffalo, 1911 (prize); Boston AC; Minnesota Indust. Soc. (gold medal); Hoosier Salon, 1934 (prize); NAC; AIC; Minneapolis Inst. Art; Muskegon AI; TMA; Buffalo AC; Brown Co. AA; AAPL; Burchfield Art Center, Buffalo, 1979

Member: Cliff Dwellers; Brown Co. AA; Beachcombers' Club; NAC; Chicago Gal. Assn.; Buffalo SA; Indiana AC; Minneapolis Aty League (founder)

Work: Roycroft Salon, East Aurora, NY; Vanderbilt Univ.; Detroit Inst. Art; St. Paul Library; Pennsylvania Hist. Soc.; LOC; Hackley Art Gal.; Minneapolis Library; Public School, Gary, IN; Women's Club, Minneapolis; South Bend, IN; Kenwood Club, Chicago.

Comments: Of French-Canadian descent, he was a prolific landscape painter in the Barbizon style who roamed the countryside of western New York and its Cazenovia Valley. Early in his career he was a decorative painter of interiors, signs, and stage scenery in Chicago. After training in Minneapolis and Paris he found increasing success. In 1898 he settled in Auvers-sur-Oise for several years in the former home of Daubigny. In 1903, he settled in East Aurora, NY, at the urging of Elbert Hubbard, founder of the utopian Roycroft Arts and Crafts community. Fournier became Roycroft's art director and decorated its inn's public rooms. In 1907, he returned to France to paint a series of landscapes in Barbizon. He was known for his spring and fall scenes, and has been called "the last American Barbizon painter." He was active in artists' colonies in Woodstock, NY, Provincetown, MA, and Brown County, IN.

Sources: WW47; Rena N. Coen, In the Mainstream - the Art of Alexis Jean Fournier (St. Cloud, MN, 1985); Krane, The Wayward Muse, 189; Fink, American Art at the Nineteenth-Century Paris Salons, 343; Falk, Exh. Record Series.

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