Sidney and Lois Eskenazi Museum of Art

About this Work

After studying with leading French academic artists, including Jean-Léon Gérôme, Edouard Vuillard emerged as a pioneer of post-Impressionism in the late nineteenth century. This early self-portrait, painted in a loose, Impressionistic style, dates to the beginning of his association with the avant-garde artists’ group known as the Nabis (prophets). Influenced by Japanese woodblock prints, the paintings of Paul Gauguin, and French literary Symbolism, the Nabis artists’ approach to painting was decorative, subjective, and experimental. Painted in a loose, brushy style, Vuillard’s self-portrait engages the viewer with an introspective and penetrating look.