Benutzer:Schnurrikowski/Vouga E

Henriette Victorine Emilie Vouga-Pradez (born May 20, 1839 in Vevey; died June 15, 1909 in Geneva) was a Swiss painter and publisher. Her paintings of flowers and animals signed "E. Vouga" enjoyed great popularity from the mid-1870s. Especially through her color lithographic prints, which were also published by her own publishing house Vouga et Cie, "Madame Vouga" became known and famous worldwide. During her lifetime she was considered an important representative of flower and animal painting.

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Henriette Victorine Emilie Pradez[1][2] was born on May 20, 1839,[3] the daughter of Marc Frédéric Pradez, a wine merchant,[2] and his wife Anne Lucile Emilie, née Gex,[4] in Vevey, Switzerland.[2] Her brother Charles Adolphe emigrated to Brazil in the 1840s and worked there as a writer,[5] while there was always close contact with her sister Françoise Marie Louise Alexandrine. In her younger years, Pradez initially worked in the commercial field.[3] In May 1861, she married Eugène Henri Vouga (1825-1903),[2] a scion of the well-known Swiss Vouga family of artists and scholars. Shortly thereafter, Vouga-Pradez followed her husband to Geneva.[6] The marriage produced several children,[7] including Charles Louis Henri Vouga, who was later involved in Vouga-Pradez's business activities.[8]

Economically secure in Geneva, Vouga-Pradez made painting her main occupation in 1872. Probably already inspired in her youth by the paintings of Alexandre Calame, she had taken some painting lessons, but acquired most of her knowledge self-taught. Even though "Madame Vouga" always worked alone artistically, she passed on her painting techniques in oils and watercolors to interested people. Among her pupils were Klara von Greyerz, Linna Vogel Irelan and the US-American Adelia Sarah Gates, who stayed in Switzerland around 1875.

Through exhibitions, for example, at the Palais de l'Athénée in Geneva,[13] in Bern[14] and Zurich[15], Vouga-Pradez quickly gained notoriety in Switzerland and beyond, and sales were good.[10] In addition, she made her works accessible to the less well-heeled in the form of reproductions. These color prints[3] appeared in various formats at the Geneva publishing house Damond, Coulin & Cie.[16] The publishing house Vouga et Cie,[17] which was presided over by her husband, was founded especially for the sale of postcards, which appeared somewhat later and were very popular - also with motifs by other artists[3].[18]

The artist always painted her floral works, many of which were executed in watercolor, on location, often in the open air and without prior sketches. For example, she went to high alpine terrain for this purpose.[6] Trips to the botanical garden in Bonn[19] and to the United States, at that time only accessible by ship across the Atlantic, are also verifiable.[20] In order to give the depicted plants a special colorful luminosity and also lightness, Vouga-Pradez introduced the use of tinted paper and, associated with this, opaque watercolors. In contrast to these special gouaches, the transparent watercolors on white paper, which had been the preferred method of flower painting up to that time, watercolors, showed plants with light-leaved flowers to much less advantage. The contrast-generating background shading required by the old painting method inevitably led to an undesirable heaviness in the composition of the picture.[21] The watercolor technique was not suitable for this purpose.

The artist often transferred her works to the stones for chromolithographic reproduction by her own hand.[17] The printing was done by the Lithographers' Cooperative in Zurich, whose chromolithographs were among the most exquisite of their time.[22] Although the reproduced images include many of the painter's depictions of animals, the most frequently printed work is a flower piece, namely the oil painting Roses in a Blue and White Porcelain Pot.[10]

Vouga-Pradez died in Geneva on June 15, 1909, at the age of 70.[23]

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Vouga-Pradez enjoyed a brilliant reputation during her lifetime, especially as a flower painter and publisher, as numerous newspapers and publications from Switzerland and the German Reich knew to report. The "unprecedented success"[24] of the "outstanding Geneva painter" was based, in addition to her productivity,[25] above all on her "original" way of painting flowers. She understood how to put studies of nature, executed with "the greatest conscientiousness," on paper in a very unique, "ingenious" way. In the elegant, yet natural-looking picture compositions, she succeeds with a "sure eye" and "sure hand" in capturing above all the lightness and delicacy of the whiteness of the objects to be depicted.[6] In the pictures, the "magic of the flower world" is thus reproduced in "wonderful moods". The "lovingly painted bouquets" gave the impression of "exuding the fragrance of nature."[27] It is not without reason that her "colorful" chromolithographic reproductions, the "famous Vouga series," enjoy a worldwide reputation. [26] The "pretty cards"[28] of "high artistic value"[29] were "one of the most beautiful souvenirs for young girls"[28] and - partly provided with pious Bible verses - were especially suitable as "souvenirs" for holidays and other occasions. [27] Transferred to wall screens and fans as well, the works of the "modest" and "charitable" artist[3] were of "extraordinary decorative effect."[30] That Vouga-Pradez had also acquired a high reputation outside Switzerland and the German Empire is attested to by honorary memberships in French, Italian, and Russian art societies.[10]

Even if the work of Vouga-Pradez - especially in the form of art prints - is still present today, the painter herself seems to have been largely forgotten. So far, there has been no professional art-historical discourse. Reception in the present is limited to comparatively brief entries in art encyclopedias. In addition, there are rather incidental mentions in connection with other artists[31] and topics of, for example, a botanical[32] and decorative arts nature.[33]