Sérusier, Paul

(1864-1927)

   painter, theorist

   Born in Paris, Paul Sérusier studied painting at the Académie Julian in Paris while pursuing his interests in music, philosophy, and oriental languages (Arabic and Hebrew). In 1888, at Pont-Aven, he joined with paul gauguin and, under Gauguin's guidance, painted Le Talisman, a small landscape on wood composed with splashes of pure color to demonstrate the idea of synthesis and to serve as reference points. With his friends from the Académie Julian, Sérusier founded the nabis group (1888), painters who practiced a colorful, postim-pressionist style with symbolic overtures, influenced primarily by Gauguin. Sérusier worked again with Gauguin in 1889 and 1890, decorating the theater of l'Œuvre de Lugné-Poe, using many symbolist designs. The spirit of these styles is manifest in Sérusier's writings, which include Esthétique de Beuron (1905) and ABC de la peinture (1921). He returned to Brittany in 1923, where he decorated the church at Châteauneuf-du-Faou. His works—Breton scenes, portraits, and landscapes—show an artist with a great sense of delicacy and personal spirituality, who presages aspects of modern art, especially that of the italian and German primitivists.