Gustave-Henri Jossot
Encyclopedia
Gustave-Henri Jossot, also known as Abdul Karim Jossot (Dijon
, France
, April 16, 1866-Sidi Bou Said
, Tunisia
, April 7, 1951), was a French caricaturist, illustrator, poster designer, Orientalist
painter, writer and thinker.
. His style as a cartoonist
is immediately recognizable for its expressive reference to the cloisonism introduced by Emile Bernard
. He travelled in Brittany
and may have been influenced by the Pont-Aven
school.
He is mainly remembered for the mark he left on several special issues of Paris journals, most notably l'Assiette au beurre, contributors to which included Kees Van Dongen
, Félix Vallotton
, František Kupka
, Steinlen, Adolphe Willette
, and Jacques Villon
.
Much of his work lampooned the bourgeoisie
, as can be seen from the titles of the illustrated books he produced: Artistes et Bourgeois (Paris: Louis Michaud 1896); Jockey-Club Sardines (1897); Minces de trognes (Paris: Hazard, 1896); Viande de Bourgeois (Paris: Louis Michaud, 1906).
His work was shown at several major collective exhibitions in Paris: Salon des Cent (1894, 1895) Salon de la Société Nationale de Beaux Arts (1895); Salon d'Automne (1908, 1909, 1911); Salon des Indépendants (1894, 1896, 1910, 1911, 1921). His big exhibition in the Rudolphinum Muséum established his international stature in 1908, then in the Salon Tunisien of 1912. Although Jossot often said he had stopped all his artistics activities, he was still sending his works to the Salon Tunisien the day of his death.
At public auction in New York (June 12, 1980) a painting of Jossot's was sold with the remarkable title "Anti Nabis" (ref: Bénézit 1999). This work, dated 1894, refers to Les Nabis
, an important influence at the time.
Following journeys to Tunisia in 1896 and 1904, he moved definitively to Sidi Bou Said
in 1911.
In 1913, Jossot converted to Islam
, taking the Muslim name Abdul Karim. Around ten years later, he followed the well-known Algeria
n Sufi shaykh
Ahmad al-Alawi
. Jossot was not the only French painter of his time to convert to Islam and Sufism: others included Ivan Aguéli
and Étienne Dinet
.
Writing in the Dépêche tunisienne (10 February 1913), Jossot contrasted the falseness of Western civilisation with the simplicity of Islam, and praised Islam for having "no mysteries, no dogmas, no priests, almost no ceremonies," and for being "the most rational religion in the world."
Jossot wrote several booklets, titled Ma Conversion, Le Sentier d'Allah and Le Foetus récalcitrant where he tried to compile and resume more than hundred articles scattered in French and Tunisian newspapers. There we can read his individualistic philosophy close to Georges Darien
, Georges Palante
, or even Jiddu Krishnamurti
, his metaphysical convictions, his anticlericalism and pacifist engagement during the two world wars, his fight against abuses of colonisation.
Jossot continued to draw caricature and to paint in the Orientalist style, and died in Sidi Bou Said in 1951. He received a simple civil burial. Just before his death Jossot confied in an unpublished memoirs titled Goutte à goutte :
Dijon
Dijon is a city in eastern France, the capital of the Côte-d'Or département and of the Burgundy region.Dijon is the historical capital of the region of Burgundy. Population : 151,576 within the city limits; 250,516 for the greater Dijon area....
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, April 16, 1866-Sidi Bou Said
Sidi Bou Said
Sidi Bou Said is a town in northern Tunisia located about 20 km from the capital, Tunis.The town got its name for a Muslim religious figure who lived there, Abou Said ibn Khalef ibn Yahia Ettamini el Beji . The town itself is a tourist attraction as it is known for the extensive use of blue and...
, Tunisia
Tunisia
Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...
, April 7, 1951), was a French caricaturist, illustrator, poster designer, Orientalist
Orientalism
Orientalism is a term used for the imitation or depiction of aspects of Eastern cultures in the West by writers, designers and artists, as well as having other meanings...
painter, writer and thinker.
Work
Jossot started his career under the guidance of Jean Paul Laurens and Eugène CarrièreEugène Carrière
Eugène Anatole Carrière was a French Symbolist artist of the Fin de siècle period. His work is best known for its brown monochrome palette. He was a close friend of the sculptor Rodin and his work influenced Picasso...
. His style as a cartoonist
Cartoonist
A cartoonist is a person who specializes in drawing cartoons. This work is usually humorous, mainly created for entertainment, political commentary or advertising...
is immediately recognizable for its expressive reference to the cloisonism introduced by Emile Bernard
Émile Bernard
Émile Henri Bernard is known as a Post-Impressionist painter who had artistic friendships with Van Gogh, Gauguin and Eugene Boch, and at a later time, Cézanne. Most of his notable work was accomplished at a young age, in the years 1886 through 1897. He is also associated with Cloisonnism and...
. He travelled in Brittany
Brittany
Brittany is a cultural and administrative region in the north-west of France. Previously a kingdom and then a duchy, Brittany was united to the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province. Brittany has also been referred to as Less, Lesser or Little Britain...
and may have been influenced by the Pont-Aven
Pont-Aven
Pont-Aven is a commune in the Finistère department of Brittany in northwestern France.-Population:Inhabitants of Pont-Aven are called in French Pontavenistes.-History:...
school.
He is mainly remembered for the mark he left on several special issues of Paris journals, most notably l'Assiette au beurre, contributors to which included Kees Van Dongen
Kees van Dongen
Cornelis Theodorus Maria van Dongen , usually known as Kees van Dongen or just Van Dongen, was a Dutch painter and one of the Fauves. He gained a reputation for his sensuous, at times garish, portraits....
, Félix Vallotton
Félix Vallotton
Félix Edouard Vallotton was a Swiss painter and printmaker associated with Les Nabis. He was an important figure in the development of the modern woodcut.-Life and work:...
, František Kupka
František Kupka
František Kupka was a Czech painter and graphic artist. He was a pioneer and co-founder of the early phases of the abstract art movement and Orphic cubism...
, Steinlen, Adolphe Willette
Adolphe Willette
Adolphe-Léon Willette was a French painter, illustrator, caricaturist, and lithographer. Willette ran as an "anti-semitic" candidate in the 19th arrondisement of Paris for the 1889 elections.-Biography:...
, and Jacques Villon
Jacques Villon
Jacques Villon was a French cubist painter and printmaker.-Early life:Born Gaston Emile Duchamp in Damville, Eure, in the Haute-Normandie region of France, he came from a prosperous and artistically inclined family...
.
Much of his work lampooned the bourgeoisie
Bourgeoisie
In sociology and political science, bourgeoisie describes a range of groups across history. In the Western world, between the late 18th century and the present day, the bourgeoisie is a social class "characterized by their ownership of capital and their related culture." A member of the...
, as can be seen from the titles of the illustrated books he produced: Artistes et Bourgeois (Paris: Louis Michaud 1896); Jockey-Club Sardines (1897); Minces de trognes (Paris: Hazard, 1896); Viande de Bourgeois (Paris: Louis Michaud, 1906).
His work was shown at several major collective exhibitions in Paris: Salon des Cent (1894, 1895) Salon de la Société Nationale de Beaux Arts (1895); Salon d'Automne (1908, 1909, 1911); Salon des Indépendants (1894, 1896, 1910, 1911, 1921). His big exhibition in the Rudolphinum Muséum established his international stature in 1908, then in the Salon Tunisien of 1912. Although Jossot often said he had stopped all his artistics activities, he was still sending his works to the Salon Tunisien the day of his death.
At public auction in New York (June 12, 1980) a painting of Jossot's was sold with the remarkable title "Anti Nabis" (ref: Bénézit 1999). This work, dated 1894, refers to Les Nabis
Les Nabis
Les Nabis were a group of Post-Impressionist avant-garde artists who set the pace for fine arts and graphic arts in France in the 1890s. Initially a group of friends interested in contemporary art and literature, most of them studied at the private art school of Rodolphe Julian in Paris in the...
, an important influence at the time.
Convictions and conversion
Jossot was branded an anarchist, which he denied. Although he was never a militant, he was certainly an acid critic of the social and political systems of his time.Following journeys to Tunisia in 1896 and 1904, he moved definitively to Sidi Bou Said
Sidi Bou Said
Sidi Bou Said is a town in northern Tunisia located about 20 km from the capital, Tunis.The town got its name for a Muslim religious figure who lived there, Abou Said ibn Khalef ibn Yahia Ettamini el Beji . The town itself is a tourist attraction as it is known for the extensive use of blue and...
in 1911.
In 1913, Jossot converted to Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
, taking the Muslim name Abdul Karim. Around ten years later, he followed the well-known Algeria
Algeria
Algeria , officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria , also formally referred to as the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria, is a country in the Maghreb region of Northwest Africa with Algiers as its capital.In terms of land area, it is the largest country in Africa and the Arab...
n Sufi shaykh
Shaykh of Sufism
A Shaykh , , of Sufism is a Sufi who is authorized to teach, initiate and guide aspiring dervishes. The shaykh is vital to the path of the novice sufi, for the shaykh has himself travelled the path of mysticism...
Ahmad al-Alawi
Ahmad al-Alawi
Ahmad al-Alawi , , was the founder of a popular modern Sufi order, the Darqawiyya Alawiyya, a branch of the Shadhiliyya.-Biography:...
. Jossot was not the only French painter of his time to convert to Islam and Sufism: others included Ivan Aguéli
Ivan Aguéli
Ivan Aguéli also named Sheikh 'Abd al-Hādī 'Aqīlī upon his acceptance of Islam, was a Swedish wandering Sufi, painter and author. As a devotee of Ibn Arabi, his metaphysics applied to the study of Islamic esoterism and its similarities with other esoteric traditions of the world...
and Étienne Dinet
Étienne Dinet
Alphonse-Étienne Dinet, also known as Nasr'Eddine Dinet was a French orientalist painter.-Biography:Dinet was born the son of a prominent French judge...
.
Writing in the Dépêche tunisienne (10 February 1913), Jossot contrasted the falseness of Western civilisation with the simplicity of Islam, and praised Islam for having "no mysteries, no dogmas, no priests, almost no ceremonies," and for being "the most rational religion in the world."
Jossot wrote several booklets, titled Ma Conversion, Le Sentier d'Allah and Le Foetus récalcitrant where he tried to compile and resume more than hundred articles scattered in French and Tunisian newspapers. There we can read his individualistic philosophy close to Georges Darien
Georges Darien
Georges Darien , , was a French writer associated with anarchism and an outspoken advocate of Georgism.- Life :...
, Georges Palante
Georges Palante
Georges Toussaint Léon Palante was a French philosopher and sociologist.He advocated aristocratic individualist ideas similar to Nietzsche and Schopenhauer. He was opposed to Émile Durkheim's holism, promoting methodological individualism instead.-Life:Palante was born in Blangy-les-Arras in the...
, or even Jiddu Krishnamurti
Jiddu Krishnamurti
Jiddu Krishnamurti or J. Krishnamurti or , was a renowned writer and speaker on philosophical and spiritual subjects. His subject matter included: psychological revolution, the nature of the mind, meditation, human relationships, and bringing about positive change in society...
, his metaphysical convictions, his anticlericalism and pacifist engagement during the two world wars, his fight against abuses of colonisation.
Jossot continued to draw caricature and to paint in the Orientalist style, and died in Sidi Bou Said in 1951. He received a simple civil burial. Just before his death Jossot confied in an unpublished memoirs titled Goutte à goutte :
" au fond du trou-terminus, nous roupillerons profondément, sans faire de cauchemars et nous ne nous réveillerons jamais. "
Pour ma part, si j'avais la liberté de choisir, ce serait cette dernière hypothèse qui aurait ma préférence : cesser d'être, ne plus rien voir, ne plus entendre, ne plus rien sentir ! Les hommes me foutant enfin la Paix avec le Repos Eternel par dessus le marché ! C'est la grâce que je me souhaite !"
Additional reading
- David Sweetman: "Explosive Acts: Toulouse-Lautrec, Oscar Wilde, Félix Fénéon and the Art & Anarchy of the Fin de Siécle" New York, Simon & Schuster 1999
- Roger Shattuck: "The Banquet Years: The origins of the Avant-garde in France, 1885 to World War I" U.S.A., Vintage Books 1968
- http://www.culture.gouv.fr/public/mistral/joconde_fr?ACTION=CHERCHER&FIELD_98=UTIL&VALUE_98=%20Jockey-Club&DOM=All&REL_SPECIFIC=1