French painter, lithographer and designer, born at Fontenay-aux-Roses. Beginning in 1888, Bonnard attended the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and the Académie Julian, where he met artists Maurice Denis, Edouard Vuillard, Paul Ranson and Paul Sérusier, who would become the group of painters called the Nabis. He had his first one-man exhibition at the Galerie Durand-Ruel, Paris, 1896. He made lithographs for the Revue Blanche and illustrated several books for Ambroise Vollard, including Parallèlement (1900) and Daphnis et Chloé (1902). His early works depict scenes of Parisian life. In 1912 bought a villa near Vernon, close to Giverny, the home of Claude Monet, and divided his time between the Seine valley and the South (Grasse, Saint-Tropez, Le Cannet). His later works, landscapes, interiors, nudes and still life, became increasingly rich in color.
