Raoul Dufy
"My eyes were made to erase all that is ugly."
Indelibly associated with the Fauvist movement, Dufy's radiant canvases are defined by the celebration of pleasure. His colourful depictions of leisure on the Côte d'Azur, the excitement of the racecourse and the panache of elegant social gatherings are rendered with astonishing facility and wit. Few artists can be said to have captured the physical sensation of joy as vividly as Dufy.
Despite the apparent freedom of his work, Dufy did not trust results that came too easily, and although right-handed he chose to paint with his left. He wrote that "...One must always break something to be true and alive, break without violence, but with firmness; the thing that must be broken is the overworked form too well known and familiar to such an extent it has lost its signification, its symbolism. Inspiration is a guide that needs no control. If it leads us away from the classic forms, we must not be afraid to lose ourselves, for in the uncertain and unknown lies part of the looked for treasure."
Dufy's interdisciplinary approach to his art would be enormously influential on later generations of artists. In addition to his work as a painter, he produced tapestries, illustrations and ceramic designs. He also painted murals for public buildings. In 1937, he executed "La Fée Electricité" for the International Exposition in Paris. At six hundred square metres, it is considered the world's largest painting.
