Charles Filiger

Born in Alsace, Charles Filiger studied at the Atelier Colarossi in Paris before settling in 1890 in the Breton village of Le Pouldu, where he befriended several of the artists working there, including Paul Gauguin, Paul Serusier, Emile Bernard, Claude-Émile Shuffenecker and the artists of the Nabis group.

Charles Filliger, Tete d'homme au beret bleu 1892

Filiger was a deeply religious man, and his work is often of a religious or mystical nature. He had a particular admiration for the work of the Italian primitives and Byzantine art, and indeed several critics likened the figures in his paintings to those of Giotto.

Charles Filliger, Famille de pecheurs 1894

Filiger exhibited only infrequently in Paris throughout his relatively brief career; most significantly at the Salon des Indépendants in 1889 and 1890 and the first Salon de la Rose + Croix in 1892. An exhibition at the Galerie Durand-Ruel in 1899 was to be his last, however, as after this he seems to have abandoned Paris, living a reclusive life in Brittany with a family by the name of Le Guellec until his death by suicide in 1928.