Cloisonnism

Cloisonnism is a Post-Impressionist style named by a Paris critic in 1888 for its resemblance to cloisonné enamel: bold, flat areas of pure color separated by firm dark outlines. It grew out of the Pont-Aven circle in Brittany, where Paul Gauguin and Émile Bernard, alongside Louis Anquetin, abandoned Impressionist atmosphere for decorative, two-dimensional design. Synthetist theory held that the artist should paint not the motif itself but the memory and feeling it leaves, simplifying and saturating form until it reads as pattern. The style's stained-glass flatness, unnatural color and outlines also looked back to medieval glass, Japanese prints and folk art. Cloisonnism briefly fused painting, printmaking and decorative design, and its reductive clarity helped open the door to twentieth-century abstraction.

Defining characteristics

• Flat areas of unmodulated color bounded by firm dark outlines
• Decorative two-dimensional design over naturalistic depth
• Simplified, synthesized forms drawn from memory rather than directly from the motif
• Unnatural, saturated color used expressively
• Stained-glass and Japanese-print flatness; strong silhouettes

Key figures

• Paul Gauguin (1848-1903) — Led the Pont-Aven circle into Synthetism and cloisonnist design
• Émile Bernard (1868-1941) — Young painter whose Breton scenes defined the outlined flat style
• Louis Anquetin (1861-1932) — Painter whose bold outlined figures helped inspire the term
• Paul Sérusier (1864-1927) — Carried Gauguin's flat color back to Paris and the Nabis

Example works

• The Yellow Christ — Paul Gauguin (1889)
• Vision After the Sermon — Paul Gauguin (1888)

Sources

• Cloisonnism - Wikipedia encyclopedia

← Back to the catalog