Amédée Ozenfant
(French, 1886–1966)
Biography
Amédée Ozenfant was a French painter and writer known for his Cubist still lifes. “Simplification, distortion of forms, and modifications of natural appearances, are ways of arriving at intense expressiveness of form,” he once said. Born on April 15, 1886 in Saint-Quentin, France, he began painting as a teenager and later moved to Paris where he studied painting under Charles Cottet. In 1915, he cofounded the magazine L’Élan with Max Jacob and Guillaume Apollinaire. The aim of the publication was to maintain the dialogue of the avant-garde for those who stayed in Paris during World War I. Disillusioned with Cubism by 1917, Ozenfant adopted a style of painting which emphasized order and precision which he called Purism. A year later, he collaborated with the architect Le Corbusier in articulating the theory of Purism in their book Après le Cubisme (1918). The artist went on to exhibit with Fernand Léger and established his own academy in Paris in 1932, before moving it to London in 1935, and New York in 1939. Ozenfant died on May 4, 1966 in Cannes, France. Today, his works are held in the collections of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., and the Tate Gallery in London, among others.
Amédée Ozenfant Artworks
Amédée Ozenfant
(353 results)
Amédée Ozenfant
Nature morte or Composition II, 1929–1929
Sale Date: February 5, 2003
Auction Closed
Amédée Ozenfant
Composition aux verres à la cruche, 1926–1926
Sale Date: February 8, 2002
Auction Closed