Aristide Maillol

Certificate enclosed from Mr Olivier Lorquin, président de la Fondation Dina Vierny-Musée Maillol.

Aristide Maillol was born December 8, 1861, in Banyuls-sur-Mer, a small fishing village in the French Pyrenees. In 1881, he moved to Paris and began applying to the École des beaux-arts, to which he was finally accepted in 1885. The strict academicism of his teachers did not appeal to him and when he encountered works by Paul Gauguin in 1889 his work changed direction. Gaugain and Maillol became friends and over the next few years Maillol produced stylized paintings of women.
Later on Maillol began working in tapestry. He exhibited at the Salon des Beaux-Arts in Paris and opened a workshop in his hometown in 1893. His bad eyesight forced him to abandon the tapestries for small terracotta sculptures. By the age of 40, in 1901, he was almost exclusively a sculptor.
Maillol’s statuettes and his later, more monumental works focus on the female figure, thick-limbed, symmetrical, and highly archetypal. Over the years, he produced and reproduced several works and themes, including "Étude pour le monument à Paul Cezanne" a half-seated, half-reclining figure. The statue's beauty lies in its simplicity. Maillol's approach was the opposite of general practice at the time, which was still influenced by the highly emotional sculptures of French sculptor Rodin.
Maillol died at the age of 83 in an automobile accident in 1944. There’s two museums dedicated to his work: Musée Maillol, Paris and in Banyuls-sur-Mer.