French painter of Russian origin, a major figure in 20th-century art. His work explores the boundary between abstraction and figuration, marked by thick layers of colored matter. His meteoric career ended with his suicide in Antibes in 1955.
Nicolas de Staël(1914 — 1955)
Nicolas de Staël
France, Empire russe
5 min read
Frequently asked questions
Famous Quotes
« I don't know whether the abstract truly exists.»
Key Facts
- Born in 1914 in Saint Petersburg into a family of the Russian aristocracy
- Fled revolutionary Russia with his family, spending his childhood in exile in Poland and then Belgium
- Developed an abstract style based on matter and color during the 1940s
- Created the Footballers series (Parc des Princes) in 1952, a return toward figuration
- Took his own life in Antibes in 1955, at the age of 41
Works & Achievements
Abstract canvases in dark flat areas and thick impasto that established his personal language between construction and color.
Series inspired by a night match, marking his return to figuration while keeping the power of abstraction.
Large canvas synthesizing the footballers series, vibrant with colored flat areas evoking the jerseys under the floodlights.
Sicilian landscapes of dazzling light, reduced to broad expanses of warm color inspired by a trip to Sicily.
Monumental unfinished canvas found in his Antibes studio, regarded as his pictorial testament with its red piano against a black background.
Anecdotes
Born in Saint Petersburg in 1914 into an aristocratic Russian family, Nicolas de Staël was orphaned at a very young age: his family fled the Russian Revolution and he lost both of his parents before the age of eight. Adopted by a Belgian family, he grew up in Brussels, far from his native Russia.
De Staël was a giant: he stood nearly two metres tall. His friends recalled that he painted with impressive physical energy, spreading the paint with a knife in thick layers that were sometimes built up into true reliefs on the canvas.
In March 1952, he attended a night-time football match at the Parc des Princes between France and Sweden. Captivated by the colours of the jerseys blazing under the floodlights, he came home deeply moved and immediately painted a whole series of canvases titled *The Footballers*.
At the end of his life, de Staël worked at a frantic pace, producing hundreds of canvases in just a few months in his studio in Antibes. Exhausted, gripped by self-doubt and a thwarted love affair, he took his own life by throwing himself from the terrace of his studio on 16 March 1955, at only 41 years old.
During the war, a penniless young painter, he endured great hardship in Paris: at times he could not afford to buy his paints, and his first wife, Jeannine, died of deprivation in 1946. It was only in the early 1950s that his success finally became dazzling.
Primary Sources
I never set abstract painting against figurative painting. A painting should be both abstract and figurative at once.
One never paints what one sees or thinks one sees; one paints, in a thousand vibrations, the blow received, the blow yet to come.
I do not have the strength to finish my paintings. Thank you for everything you have done for me.
Key Places
Birthplace of Nicolas de Staël, where he was born in 1914 into a family of the Russian aristocracy. He left it as a child during the revolution.
City where the young orphan was taken in and grew up, and where he studied at the Fine Arts academy. It was there that he decided to become a painter.
Capital where de Staël settled and experienced poverty and then acclaim within the School of Paris. There he met Braque and exhibited his first major canvases.
City on the French Riviera where he set up his studio in 1954 and feverishly produced his final works. It was there that he took his own life in 1955.
Typical Objects
A tool with a flexible metal blade that de Staël preferred to the brush for spreading thick layers of paint. He used it to build up his canvases in flat areas of colored matter.
Colors in tubes that the painter often applied almost pure and in large quantities. The thick matter, or impasto, is the signature of his work.
A support stretched over a frame, often of very large dimensions, on which de Staël developed his landscapes and compositions. The monumental formats heighten the power of his flat areas of color.
A board on which the artist mixes his colors before laying them down. On it, de Staël composed the harmonies of warm and cool tones that structure his paintings.
A wooden support that holds the canvas upright during work. Given the size of his works, de Staël often worked standing in front of sturdy easels.
School Curriculum
Vocabulary & Tags
Key Vocabulary
Tags
Daily Life
Morning
De Staël rose early and headed to his studio, a vast space bathed in northern light or, in Antibes, opening onto the sea. He often began by observing his works in progress before attacking the paint with a palette knife.
Afternoon
His afternoons were devoted to relentless work: he painted standing, sometimes several canvases at once, in periods of intense productivity during which he completed dozens of works in a matter of weeks.
Evening
In the evening, he kept up a rich correspondence with his poet friends such as René Char and his dealer Jacques Dubourg. He also mingled with gallery owners and collectors, or immersed himself in music and reading.
Food
During his youth in Paris, he knew poverty and at times hunger, to the point that his hardships gravely affected his family. Having grown prosperous in the 1950s, he led a more comfortable life, without ever losing his frugal and focused temperament.
Clothing
A very tall man, he wore the clothes of a mid-20th-century artist: loose trousers, practical shirts and jackets, often spattered with paint in the studio.
Housing
He lived in a succession of studios in Brussels, Nice, Paris and then Antibes. His final studio, on the ramparts of Antibes facing the Mediterranean, combined workspace and living quarters.
Historical Timeline
Period Vocabulary
Liens externes & ressources
Références
Œuvres
Composition (séries abstraites)
vers 1946-1949
Les Footballeurs (Parc des Princes)
1952
Le Parc des Princes
1952
Agrigente
1953-1954
Le Concert
1955
