Présentation
Lucien Fontanarosa (1912-1975)
Biographical landmarks
1912 Lucien Fontanarosa comes into the world on December 19th, in Paris. His father, François Fontanarosa, and his mother, Stéphanie Lucchin, are Italian. At the beginning of 1912, they settle in Paris, where the father works as a tailor. Lucien spends his childhood between Paris and Italy.
1923 The Fontanarosa family settles down for good in Paris. Ever since Lucien is twelve years old, he spends hours drawing sketches in the streets of Paris, along the banks of the Seine, or in the suburbs. That explains Lucien's everlasting feeling that he has been drawing for his whole life.
1927 He enters the Ecole Estienne in Paris, where he attends lithographic drawing classes.
1931 Lucien works more and more. He goes to evening classes at the Ecole des Arts Appliqués (school of applied arts). He draws in the Louvre, in the Jardin des Plantes and in the streets. He publishes his first lithographs (L'île Saint-Louis).
1932 He enters the Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts (fine arts national school) as a non-registered student, in Lucien Simon's class.
1934 He exhibits Les Musiciens at the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts (fine arts national society). He obtains a national grant and goes off to Spain.
1936 For the first time, the French State buys one of Lucien's works. The City of Paris gives him the Grand Prix d'Afrique du Nord, which enables him to spend a year in Morocco. He comes back to Paris to go in for the Concours de Rome. Thus, he is awarded the Premier Grand Prix de Rome.
1937 Lucien's stay in the Villa Medicis enables him to work in the museums and to travel throughout Tuscany and Venetia.
1939 He is commissioned by the State to decorate one of the four entries of the French Pavillon at the Water Exhibition in Liège (Belgium). He fulfills this assignement with another painter, Annette Faive - whom he met in 1933 in Lucien Simon's class, and who will soon become Mrs Lucien Fontanarosa. When he comes back from Rome, he moves in a studio near the Buttes-Chaumont. When war begins, he is drafted into the infantry.
1942 The Musée National d'Art Moderne (French national museum of modern art) buys Les Buttes-Chaumont.Lucien and Annette's first son, Patrice Fontanarosa, comes into the world.
1943 Returning from captivity, Lucien's friend Jacques Ratier opens the Chardin Gallery in Paris (36, rue de Seine), where Lucien will regularly exhibit.
1944 Frédérique Fontanarosa comes into the world.
1945 Lucien becomes member of the jury of the Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts. He travels in Brittany. He begins to work as a book illustrator, an art he will exercise during his whole career. He illustrates novels by Gide, Giono, Malraux, Montherlant, Mac Orlan... and works on several medieval epics. All in all, he draws nearly a thousand illustrations in fifty nine books.
1946 Lucien is nominated member of the jury for the Concours de Rome and becomes a teacher at the American Academy of Fontainebleau.Renaud Fontanarosa comes into the world.
1947 First exhibition at the Chardin Gallery. The French State purchases Le pichet d'étain and Nature morte aux poires et citrons.
1949 Second personal exhibition at the Chardin Gallery. He shows La répétition at the Pavillon de Marsan.
1950 Personal exhibition in Lyon. Lucien travels in Tuscany.From 1950 to 1974, he illustrates more than 120 covers for the publishing house "Le Livre de Poche" (Camus, Cesbron, Dumas, Gide, Hemingway, Montherlant...).
1954 Third personal exhibition at the Chardin Gallery; music is the theme.
1955 Lucien is elected member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts (fine arts French academy) (Institut de France).
1956 Exhibition at the Marlborough Gallery, in London.
1957 Lucien is made chevalier of the Legion of Honour by the French Ministry of Education. Exhibitions at the Leandro Gallery in Geneva (up to 1967).
1958 Exhibition at the Chardin Gallery. Lucien is appointed drawing and plastic arts teacher at the Ecole Polytechnique. The City of Paris purchases Le dimanche au bord de la Marne.
1961 Lucien decorates the Roussillon apartment on the liner France, and he draws a fresco in the Ecole Estienne. He is awarded the Grand Prix de Peinture de La Ville de Paris.
1962 In May, he presents his fifth exhibition at the Chardin Gallery; Venice is the theme. He paints a vast decoration in the library of the Science Faculty in Orsay University.
1963 Exhibition at the Palm Beach Gallery in Florida. He illustrates several telegram forms for the French post office. Exhibition at the Verrière Gallery in Lyon (up to 1967).
1964 He sets his studio in the 17th district of Paris (32, Cité des Fleurs). He paints the ceiling of the Honoré d'Estienne d'Orves high school in Nice. The French National Bank asks Lucien to illustrate bank notes; 500-franc note (Pascal, 1964), 100-franc note (Delacroix, 1965), 50-franc note (Quentin de la Tour, 1967), 10-franc note (Berlioz, 1969).
1967 He participates in a collective exhibition at the Palais de la Méditerranée in Nice.
1969 Pierre Cailler's publishing house in Geneva publishes a book about Lucien and his works.
1971-72 He publishes six lithographs on Venice printed at the Mourlot workshop.
1973 The Salon des Peintres Témoins de leur Temps (Painters as Witnesses of their Time) in Paris - where he has been presenting regular exhibitions since 1955 - awards Lucien its Grand Prix for 1973. The Palais de la Méditerranée, in Nice, presents a retrospective which gathers 150 of his paintings.
1974 He pays an ultimate tribute to youth, love and life with Les amoureux dans la ville, which he exhibits at the Salon des Peintres Témoins de leur Temps. Le boxeur, which he painted in 1957, is showed in the Musée du Sport, in Paris.
1975 Lucien prepares an exhibition scheduled for the spring of 1976. But at the end of March, his bad health calls for his hospitalization. He dies a few weeks later, on Sunday, April 27th. Most of Lucien Fontanarosa's works are part of private collections and can be seen at the Musée National d'Art Moderne in Paris, at the Musée d'Art Moderne of the City of Paris, at the Musée de l'Ile de France in Sceaux, at the Musée du Sport in Paris, at the Crédit Agricole Bank in Paris, and in the museums of Albi, Boulogne-Billancourt, Cambrai, Chartres, Roubaix, Sofia (Bulgaria), Bejaia (Algeria)...
Lucien Fontanarosa painted numerous State commissioned frescoes and decorations; for the Ecole Estienne in Paris, for the Science Faculty in Orsay University, for the chapel of Saint-Camille Hospital in Bry-sur-Marne, and for various high schools in Nice, Lille, Châtellerault, Vierzon, Malakoff, Saint-Maur-des-Fossés, Nogent le Rotrou...
The Lucien Fontanarosa Foundation was created in 1985 on Annette Faive-Fontanarosa's and Stéphane Löber's initiative. Its purpose is to contribute to the organization and preparation of exhibitions.
Since 1993, Lucien Fontanarosa's works are permanently exhibited at the Bernheim-Jeune Gallery in Paris (83, rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré, 8th district).
In 1993, the City of Paris paid tribute to Lucien Fontanarosa by naming after him a public garden in the 17th district. In April 1995, on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of his death, a commemorative plate was set at the address of his last studio, also in the 17th district of Paris (32, Cité des Fleurs).
Lucien Fontanarosa's works are permanently exhibited at the Bernheim-Jeune Gallery, 83 rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré 75008 Paris France
