Camille Pissarro

French painter and printmaker, 1830–1903

BiographyFrench Impressionist painter, etcher and lithographer. Born in Saint Thomas in the Danish West Indies, of French parents, he accompanied the Danish artist Fritz Melbye to Caracas 1853-5, making drawings and watercolours, then moved to Paris in 1855 to study art. After a brief period at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, he went on to work at the Académie Suisse where he met Monet, Cézanne and Guillaumin. He settled in 1866 at Pontoise where he mentored both Cézanne and later to Gauguin, occasionally painting alongside them from the same motif. He contributed to all six Impressionist exhibitions 1874-86 and was the most constant supporter of the group. After meeting Seurat and Signac in 1885, worked 1885-90 with a Divisionist technique. He moved in 1882 from Pontoise to Osny and in 1884 settled at Eragny near Gisors (Eure). From 1893 he began a series of views of Paris (the Boulevard Montmartre, the Pont Neuf, etc.), and also series of Rouen, Dieppe and Le Havre. Died in Paris.

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