David Dellepiane – Arts & Modernity

The Musée Regards de Provence pays tribute to the painter, poster artist, lithographer, illustrator and designer, David Dellepiane (1866-1932) and reveals the many facets of his talent.

This exhibition brings together nearly 90 posters, drawings, paintings, from museums, galleries and private collectors enabling to appreciate his inspiration fields and production in its diversity.

Born in Genoa, and at the age of 9 became a child of cosmopolitan Marseille, the proximity of the View-Port was a constant invitation to travel and a real source of inspiration. Trained at the School of Fine Arts in Marseille and within several workshops, the influence of his teachers along with his  undeniable knowledge of navigation naturally led him to turn to Marine paintings. The daily rich artistic atmosphere of his craftsman family, has encouraged his vocation, his curiosity, his taste for well done work and the decor, but also patience and humility.

His Paris period appears as the moment where the artist work towards modernity, with the approach of Art Nouveau. The discovery of the Louvre, his visits to avant-garde galleries, china shops and Japanese prints in vogue, scored his research in pictorial material. Motivated by the experiences and knowledge gained in Paris and Genoa, back in Marseille in 1890, Dellepiane produced in abundance both on lithographic stones and canvas, genre scenes, group portraits, views of the port of Marseille and Provencal landscapes.

The artist was endowed with great natural curiosity, eclectic taste, a sense of humor, an interest in history and archeology, a facility to capture and endorse the great contemporary intellectual and artistic movements of his time.

Dellepiane has absorbed the development of Japanese art, the birth and flourishing of Art Nouveau and Art Deco and has mixed these artistic vocabularies boldly.

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