An Orgy of Colour: Patrick Heron and Maurice de Vlaminck

How did modern art get from Vlaminck’s flower paintings to the abstract work of Patrick Heron? Find out in this talk by Dr Simon Marginson

Taking Vlaminck’s ‘Vase de fleurs’ (Vase of Flowers), currently on display in The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, as his starting point, Dr Simon Marginson will trace a selective genealogy to look at the persistence of flower painting in modern art. He will go on to examine how the legacies of modernist flower painting fed into the abstract work of Patrick Heron, represented in The Stanley & Audrey Burton collection by ‘Images in Red’.

Maurice de Vlaminck was one of the original Fauves (Wild Beasts), a loose grouping of artists that also included Henri Matisse and André Derain. Like them, Vlaminck was a renowned colourist, whose paintings are celebrated for their vibrant use of strong, clean tones.

In 1905 the Fauves constituted the vanguard of European modernism, but by the end of the Second World War this was no longer the case. Vlaminck’s latest paintings were repetitive and uninspired, and the artist was an increasingly reactionary figure; denouncing modern art and lashing out at cubism and abstraction in virulent articles.

The British abstract painter and cubist enthusiast Patrick Heron seemed unconcerned. In 1947 he agreed to write an introduction to a catalogue of Vlaminck’s latest works. Despite their obvious difference Heron still admired Vlaminck, as the two men shared a belief in the expressive power of colour and the primacy of sensation in art. And, like Vlaminck, Heron found inspiration in flowers for his formal experiments in art.

Those who arrive early will be able to see Heron’s ‘Images in Red’ and Vlaminck’s ‘Vase de fleurs’ on display in The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery before the talk starts. Vlaminck’s work is on loan from Marks and Spencer Group plc for the benefit of the City of Leeds.