Bande noire

The Bande noire (Black Band) was a loosely defined group of French painters of the 1890s who worked in a darker, richer palette than their Impressionist contemporaries, fusing Impressionist color with the raw, melancholy realism of Gustave Courbet. The name came from Charles Cottet's sombre canvas The Burial, shown at the Paris Salon of 1894. Sometimes called "the Nubians" to distinguish them from the Nabis, the group - Cottet, Lucien Simon, Emile-Rene Menard, Rene-Xavier Prinet, and Andre Dauchez among them - favored scenes of peasant and seafaring life in Brittany and elsewhere, rendered without Impressionist sparkle. Their sober light and earthy color carried the Realist tradition into the modern era, at once mourning and documenting provincial life.

Defining characteristics

• Dark, rich palette - browns, deep greens, muted tones - in place of Impressionist brightness
• Somber, often melancholy subjects: burials, peasant and coastal life
• Impressionist-influenced brushwork tempered by Courbet's raw realism
• Muted, overcast light rather than sparkling plein-air effects
• Sympathetic, unsentimental treatment of rural and working people

Key figures

• Charles Cottet (1863-1925) — Leader of the group; his Salon canvas The Burial (1894) gave the band its name
• Lucien Simon (1861-1945) — Painter of Breton peasant and studio life in dark, warm tonality
• Emile-Rene Menard (1862-1930) — Tonal landscape painter of arcadian scenes associated with the group

Example works

• The Burial — Charles Cottet (1894)

Sources

• Bande noire - Wikipedia encyclopedia

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