Émile Friant
The price of a painting by Émile Friant at auction ranges from €80 to €60,000. The average estimate for a multiple (lithograph, print, etching, etc.) is between €20 and €150, while the price for a drawing or watercolor ranges from €30 to €3,000.
Youth and training in Lorraine: a precocious artist
Born in Dieuze, Lorraine, in 1863, Émile Friant moved to Nancy in 1870 with his family because of the Prussian invasion. While attending the École Professionnelle de l'Est, he caught the eye of Théodore Devilly, director of Nancy's Beaux-Arts, and was admitted. Thanks to this apprenticeship and his natural talent, young Émile exhibited at the city's Salon des Beaux-Arts in 1878, at the age of fifteen, notably with a representation of the Porte Saint-Georges, exhibited at the Palace of the Dukes of Lorraine.
Promising auctions: from painting to engraving
Like Jules Bastien-Lepage, another Lorraine painter who preceded him, Émile Friant arrived in Paris and exhibited paintings on Lorraine subjects, as well as portraits of close collectors, such as the Coquelin brothers.
Interested in engraving since 1883, he engraved five copper plates with drypoint and etching. His style, considered too realistic, was in fact symptomatic of his naturalism, bringing him closer to photographic precision, an invention that fascinated him and was spreading at the time.
Travel the world with Friant: travel and artistic rewards
Awarded a travel grant in 1886, he traveled to several countries, including Holland, Italy, Malta and Tunis. Friant won several awards, including the gold medal for "La Toussaint" at the 1889 Universal Exhibition and the Légion d'Honneur.
Artistic evolution and late recognition
Refusing to follow emerging styles such as Fauvism and Cubism, Émile Friant enjoyed his last honors at the end of the 19th century. At the beginning of the 20th century, he developed his activity as an engraver, preferring drypoint, with more than seventy different subjects engraved up to 1913.
He became a professor at the Beaux-Arts de Paris in 1906, and was elected a member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in 1923, dying in 1932.
Explore the auction: Émile Friant's lively naturalism
Émile Friant's pictorial style is hypnotic, demonstrating obvious technical mastery. Despite the apparent spontaneity of the easel and framing, the image finds its dynamic harmony, suggesting an elsewhere. His etchings, with many portraits, present a photo-realistic approach to faces, often contrasting with the more sketch-like character of the rest of the image.
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