Detail from The Canal, Amsterdam, 1889, James McNeill Whistler, The Hunterian, University of Glasgow

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Joris-Karl Huysmans

Birthname: Charles Marie Georges Huysmans
Nationality: French
Date of birth: 1848
Place of birth: Paris
Date of death: 1907
Category: art critic

Identity:

Charles Marie Georges ('Joris Karl') Huysmans was an author, poet and critic.

Life:

Huysmans was a French novelist and critic, initially a follower of Zola, later a symbolist and a devout Roman Catholic. He is mainly remembered for A Rebours, with its protagonist des Esseintes, who pursues an extreme aesthetic and decadent life style. His art criticism is collected in L'Art Moderne (1883), and Certains (1889), the latter including an essay on Whistler.

Bibliography:

Huysmans, Joris Karl, A Rebours, Paris, 1884 ; Huysmans, Joris Karl, Certains: G. Moreau - Degas - Cheret - Wisthler [sic] - Rops - Le Monstre - Le Fer, etc., Paris, 1889 .

Getty website; Baldick, Robert, The Life of J.-K. Huysmans, Oxford, 1955; Monneret, S., L'Impressionisme et son époque, Paris, 1978-79.