Rodolphe Julian

Who he was

Pierre Louis Rodolphe Julian (born 13 June 1839 at Lapalud, Vaucluse; died in Paris in February 1907) was a French painter, etcher and art teacher, founder and director of the Académie Julian. He was the son of Pierre Louis Julian and Sophie Favier, who married in 1847 and so legitimated Rodolphe and his elder sister. His father sent him as a clerk to a bookshop in Marseille; he drew well, went to Paris, studied under Léon Cogniet and Alexandre Cabanel without entering the École des Beaux-Arts, and exhibited at the Salons from 1863 (fr.wikipedia.org, "Rodolphe Julian"). On the day he is decorated, Julian tells the atelier: "a poor little peasant who left his village with nothing... Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur!" (091.0122). The two best-known sources disagree on the day of his death: 2 February 1907 (en.wikipedia.org) or 11 February 1907, at his home in the rue d'Amboise (fr.wikipedia.org). He is buried at Lapalud.

Julian's career as a painter was moderate. From 1866 he lived and worked at 36 rue Vivienne, and in 1868, needing money, he opened an academy which admitted women and engaged well-known Salon painters as teachers. After about 1880 its success let him give up painting. He was named chevalier of the Légion d'honneur in 1881 (a fact Marie records on the day, 12 February 1881: 091.0117-0125). In 1895 he married the painter Amélie Beaury-Saurel (#Amelie_Beaury_Saurel), who ran the academy after his death in 1907 (en.wikipedia.org; marriage date 9 January 1895 according to a second source). The academy lasted until 1968.

The Académie Julian

The Académie Julian (see #Julian) was one of the most important private art schools in Paris. It admitted foreigners, set no entrance examination, and from the beginning gave women the opportunity to work from the nude; the École des Beaux-Arts did not admit women until 1897. Marie's own account of its working day at the start (075.0124) is a short description: a women's atelier open from eight to twelve and from one to five, with a nude man posing when she arrives. The teachers named in her diary are Tony #Robert_Fleury, Jules Lefebvre and Gustave Boulanger (the three judges of the monthly competitions: 076.0245; 084.0017), Pierre-Auguste Cot (090.0593) and William Bouguereau (099.0004). By 1884 Julian ran three addresses, which Marie lists: his lodging at the place Boëldieu, the men's studios at 48 rue du Faubourg-Saint-Denis and the women's at 27 passage des Panoramas (104.0411).

Marie and Julian

Student (October 1877 - 1879)

Marie first mentions the women's atelier on 2 October 1877, "the only serious one for women" (075.0124), and the diary has her working there from the next day. Within days Julian is astonished by the progress of "a beginner" (075.0128; 075.0150; 075.0208); on 24 November 1877, privately, he tells her that what she does is "phenomenal", adding that he never says so in front of others (076.0207-0216). She calls him "le patron" and "le père", and his study "the confessional" (076.0433; 081.0181) because it is where she comes to talk. In March 1878 he warns her: "expect to be hated here, for I have seen no one make such a breach in five months" (079.0046). On 14 January 1879 he announces that she has won the atelier's competition medal (084.0024). She calls him "the illustrious Director of the Folies-Julian" (085.0319), and he keeps her pen caricature of the atelier in his album (076.0102; her painted caricature of him, c. 1878, is #Caricature_Rodolphe_Julian). In July 1880 he carries a new portrait of hers downstairs to the men's atelier "to prove that the women are strong" (089.0103).

Adviser, confidant, patron (1880 - 1881)

From 1879 Julian is also her confidant on matters of the heart: in May 1879 he "reads her like a book" during her Bonapartist infatuation (085.0098-0101; 085.0131), and in 1881 he believes she had been wholly in love with Paul de Cassagnac (091.0046-0047); in June 1880 she says "Julian is someone for me, since I talk with him of my most intimate feelings" (088.0756). He plans her Salon pictures with her (087.0443-0454; 087.0513) and announces on 7 April 1880 that her first Salon submission is accepted (087.0802). On 24 December 1880 he proposes the subject that became #L_Atelier_Julian: she is to paint a corner of the atelier, with three life-size figures in front, and in return the canvas will belong to him, "whatever its state of completion"; he makes Amélie the same offer for the whole of the rue Vivienne atelier (090.0447-0451). The cost of opening the partition in the studio is first laid on Marie (090.0482), then borne by him (091.0009; 091.0560). In February and March 1881 the commission strains their friendship: on 7 March he tells her, in front of Mlle de Villevieille and to Amélie's delight, that the picture lacks "quality of paint" (091.0260-0267), she pays for a canvas of his that was damaged behind hers (091.0251-0269), and on 19 March he says he is "furious" to have given her so ambitious a subject for a first picture (091.0312). On 31 March - 1 April he brings the news that it is accepted (091.0400-0405). On 16 May 1881 he advises her not to leave for Russia (092.0013); on 27 July he spends two hours frightening her into taking her health seriously (092.0333-0335).

Years of criticism (1881 - 1883)

Marie reproaches him for harshness and favouritism. In November 1881 she writes that his growing closeness to Amélie has cost her "a friend, a confidant, an aid", and that he will use his influence to win Amélie a medal (093.0369-0375). After her illness she feels that he treats her unjustly: his judgement of her "old fisherman" (096.0325-0326), his remark that she is "only pretending to work" (097.0129-0133; 097.0153-0163), his demand for "a picture that stops the artists" (097.0213). Yet on 6 October 1882 she writes that Julian is "my confidant, the only one in the world" (096.0351), and on 5 December he carries one of her studies downstairs to show to the men (097.0195-0196). On 19 February 1883 their friendship breaks: she stops going to the atelier, writes of him bitterly (098.0356-0365) and gets a note from him asking what the reproach is (098.0371). They are reconciled by 8 March (098.0471) and he comes to see her new picture on 14 March (098.0491). On 25 March he announces that her painting has been accepted with the "number 3", with a note, "O naïveté, O sublime ignorance" (098.0570-0583).

The Salon of 1883 and the medal of 1884

On 12 May 1883 Julian sees her street-boys picture and announces an honourable mention as certain (099.0424-0435). When the jury awards only a mention, for her pastel, and her painting is rehung high on the wall ("sent up to heaven": 099.0586; 099.0580), Marie rushes to his office (099.0566) and takes Tony Robert-Fleury's letters to him (099.0600); by June she is asking herself why she still considers him a friend (100.0054-0055). In December 1883 he sees her statue sketch and is delighted; she distrusts him for that ("Admirablement bien construit!": 102.0521-0532). On 22 March 1884 he predicts her Un meeting will be accepted "at least no. 3" (103.0561), and in April and May he says a medal is possible, "he will put in a hand and a half" (104.0022; 104.0081). After the third-class medals are voted at the end of May 1884, Maurin (painter of Julian's portrait) receives one and Marie none (104.0350), she sends Julian an accusing letter and a telegram (104.0350; 104.0377); he telegraphs back that she has just had "recent and cruel proof that a childish, sickly vanity brings neither sympathy nor talent" (104.0396-0397). The next morning she writes "an enraged letter", tries to call it back, and finds that Rosalie has met Julian holding all her letters, "furious and crushed" (104.0408-0412). She writes again to withdraw the insults (104.0414), and on 28 May he writes to Dina that he is ashamed for her, and asks her not to think him capable of base tricks (104.0416). In June she writes that she is beginning "to hate Julian a little" (104.0585-0588) and on 6 July that he has "played a dirty trick" by not accompanying her to find the wrestlers she wants to study (105.0069-0072).

The last months (July - October 1884)

They are on cooler terms. On 18 September 1884 she writes: "I saw Julian! I missed him. But we have not seen each other for so long that we have little to say": he finds her looking "arrived" and calm, and praises her drawing for Le Figaro (106.0081). He visits her at least once more in October (106.0175), and on 19 October he and Tony dine with the Bashkirtseffs (106.0189), the last mention in the diary.

Remarks about Julian's origins

In moments of anger Marie calls Julian "ce Juif" and "un sale Juif" (090.0528; 091.0560; 098.0356; 102.0681; 103.0302). The epithet is hers and belongs to the antisemitism of her milieu; no biographical source consulted records Jewish ancestry for Julian, whose family came from Lapalud in the Vaucluse and who was educated in Marseille.

Notable students

Historical significance

The Académie Julian played a crucial role in the history of women's art education. At a time when women were excluded from the official French art academy, Julian provided professional-level training that enabled women to compete in the Salon and develop serious artistic careers. The school operated continuously from 1868 until 1968, training generations of artists from around the world.

Related entries

Sources