René Lalique
Encyclopedia
Glass art
Studio glass or glass sculpture is the modern use of glass as an artistic medium to produce sculptures or three-dimensional artworks. Specific approaches include working glass at room temperature cold working, stained glass, working glass in a torch flame , glass beadmaking, glass casting, glass...
known for his creations of perfume
Perfume
Perfume is a mixture of fragrant essential oils and/or aroma compounds, fixatives, and solvents used to give the human body, animals, objects, and living spaces "a pleasant scent"...
bottles, vase
Vase
The vase is an open container, often used to hold cut flowers. It can be made from a number of materials including ceramics and glass. The vase is often decorated and thus used to extend the beauty of its contents....
s, jewellery
Jewellery
Jewellery or jewelry is a form of personal adornment, such as brooches, rings, necklaces, earrings, and bracelets.With some exceptions, such as medical alert bracelets or military dog tags, jewellery normally differs from other items of personal adornment in that it has no other purpose than to...
, chandelier
Chandelier
A chandelier is a branched decorative ceiling-mounted light fixture with two or more arms bearing lights. Chandeliers are often ornate, containing dozens of lamps and complex arrays of glass or crystal prisms to illuminate a room with refracted light...
s, clock
Clock
A clock is an instrument used to indicate, keep, and co-ordinate time. The word clock is derived ultimately from the Celtic words clagan and clocca meaning "bell". A silent instrument missing such a mechanism has traditionally been known as a timepiece...
s and automobile hood ornament
Hood ornament
A hood/bonnet ornament, or radiator cap, or car mascot is a specially crafted model of something which symbolizes a car company like a badge, located on the front center portion of the hood...
s. He was born in the French village of Ay
Ay, Marne
Ay is a commune in the Marne department in north-eastern France.-Champagne:...
on 6 April 1860 and died 5 May 1945. He started a glassware firm, named after himself, which still remains successful.
Life and education
Lalique's early life was spent learning the methods of design and art he would use in his later life. At the age of two, his family moved to a suburb of Paris, but traveled to Ay for summer holidays. These trips influenced Lalique's later naturalistic glasswork. In 1872, when he was twelve, he entered the Collège Turgot where he started drawing and sketching. With the death of his father two years later, Lalique began working as an apprentice to goldsmith Louis AucocLouis Aucoc
Louis Aucoc , was a leading Parisian art nouveau jeweller and goldsmith, working with his father and brother André....
in Paris and attended evening classes at the Ecole des arts décoratifs
École nationale supérieure des arts décoratifs
The École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs is a public university of art and design and is one of the most prestigious French grande école...
. He worked there from 1874-1876 and subsequently spent two years at the Sydenham
Sydenham
Sydenham is an area and electoral ward in the London Borough of Lewisham; although some streets towards Crystal Palace Park, Forest Hill and Penge are outside the ward and in the London Borough of Bromley, and some streets off Sydenham Hill are in the London Borough of Southwark. Sydenham was in...
Art College in London.
Art Nouveau jewelry designer
Freelancer
A freelancer, freelance worker, or freelance is somebody who is self-employed and is not committed to a particular employer long term. These workers are often represented by a company or an agency that resells their labor and that of others to its clients with or without project management and...
, designing pieces of jewellery for French jewelers, Cartier
Cartier SA
Cartier S.A., commonly known as Cartier , is a French luxury jeweler and watch manufacturer. The corporation carries the name of the Cartier family of jewellers whose control ended in 1964 and who were known for numerous pieces including the "Bestiary" , the diamond necklace created for Bhupinder...
, Boucheron
Boucheron
Boucheron is a French jewellery house.-History:The House of Boucheron is a French family dynasty founded by Frederic Boucheron in 1858....
and others. In 1885, he opened his own business and designed and made his own jewellery and other glass pieces. By 1890, Lalique was recognized as one of France's foremost Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau is an international philosophy and style of art, architecture and applied art—especially the decorative arts—that were most popular during 1890–1910. The name "Art Nouveau" is French for "new art"...
jewellery designers; creating innovative pieces for Samuel Bing
Samuel Bing
Siegfried Bing , often referenced erroneously as "Samuel Bing", was a German art dealer who lived in Paris as an adult, and who helped introduce Japanese art and artworks to the West and was a factor in the development of the Art Nouveau style during the late nineteenth century.-Biography:Bing was...
's new Paris shop, Maison de l'Art Nouveau
Maison de l'Art Nouveau
The Maison de l'Art Nouveau , abbreviated often as L'Art Nouveau, and known also as Maison Bing for the owner, was a gallery opened on on 26 December 1895, by Siegfried Bing at 22 rue de Provence, Paris....
. He went on to be one of the most famous in his field, his name synonymous with creativity, beauty and quality.
Glass maker
Art Deco
Art deco , or deco, is an eclectic artistic and design style that began in Paris in the 1920s and flourished internationally throughout the 1930s, into the World War II era. The style influenced all areas of design, including architecture and interior design, industrial design, fashion and...
style. He was responsible for the walls of lighted glass and elegant coloured glass columns which filled the dining room and "grand salon" of the and the interior fittings, cross, screens, reredos, font of St. Matthew's Church
St Matthew's Church, Millbrook
St Matthew's Church, also known as the Glass Church, is in Millbrook, in the parish of Saint Lawrence, Jersey in the Channel Islands. Built in 1840, the church is known for its glass-work by René Lalique. St Matthew's is an active Church of England church in the Diocese of Winchester and the...
at Millbrook in Jersey
Jersey
Jersey, officially the Bailiwick of Jersey is a British Crown Dependency off the coast of Normandy, France. As well as the island of Jersey itself, the bailiwick includes two groups of small islands that are no longer permanently inhabited, the Minquiers and Écréhous, and the Pierres de Lecq and...
(Lalique's Glass Church). His earlier experiences in Ay were his defining influence in his later work. As a result, many of his jewelry pieces and vases showcase plants, flowers and flowing lines.
On May 5, 1945 René Lalique was buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery
Père Lachaise Cemetery
Père Lachaise Cemetery is the largest cemetery in the city of Paris, France , though there are larger cemeteries in the city's suburbs.Père Lachaise is in the 20th arrondissement, and is reputed to be the world's most-visited cemetery, attracting hundreds of thousands of visitors annually to the...
in Paris, France. His granddaughter, Marie Claude-Lalique (b. 1936), was also a glass maker. She died on April 14, 2003 in Fort Myers, Florida
Fort Myers, Florida
Fort Myers is the county seat and commercial center of Lee County, Florida, United States. Its population was 62,298 in the 2010 census, a 29.23 percent increase over the 2000 figure....
.
External links
- Rene Lalique Biography at RLalique.com.
- Lalique company, with a biography of the artist from the company web site.
- Lalique jewels in the Museu Calouste GulbenkianMuseu Calouste GulbenkianMuseu Calouste Gulbenkian is a museum in Lisbon, Portugal, containing a collection of ancient, and some modern art...
- This is Jersey article on St Matthew's Millbrook, the "Glass Church".
- Musée Lalique official website of the only European museum entirely about Lalique