Jean-Louis Forain

(French, 1852–1931)

Jean-Louis Forain was a French Impressionist known for his paintings and etchings of Parisian nightlife, operas, and cafes. In his painting Tight-Rope Walker (c. 1885), Forain employed similar techniques to those used by his friend Edgar Degas, including flecks of bright color, a blurred background, and isolated moments of sharp detail. “He is the poet of corruption in evening clothes, of dandyism in the boudoirs, of high life masking empty hearts,” the critic Octave Maus once wrote of him. Born on October 23, 1852 in Reims, France, he moved with his family to Paris at the age of eleven and later studied under Jean-Léon Gérôme at the École des Beaux-Arts. Turned down by the Salon in 1874, Forain began frequenting the Café Guerbois, where he met Édouard Manet and Degas, whose work greatly influenced his own. Forain was also friends with a number of writers, such as Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Verlaine, and Joris-Karl Huysmans. The artist began addressing more political subjects later in his life, and contributed illustrations to a number of major periodicals. He notably served as a camouflage artist and cartoonist during World War I, and was lauded for his patriotism during the conflict. The artist died on July 11, 1931 in Paris, France. Today, Forain’s works are held in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, and the National Gallery in London, among others.