Adolphe Appian

Appian was born in Lyon and changed his name to Adolphe Appian when he became fifteen. At the age of fifteen Appian attended the Ecole des Beaux-Arts at Lyon which was an art school which specialized in training to decorate fabrics by a local silk industry. He studied under Jean-Michel Grobon and Augustin Alexandre Thierrat. Later he opened a studio in Lyon and worked as a graphic designer. He travelled to Paris to finish his studies and after he had exhibited a painting and a charcoal drawing in the Paris Salon in 1853 he became friends with Camille Corot and Charles-François Daubigny who greatly influenced his style. Appian was elected a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour.[1][2]

In 1866, Appian's two works that he exhibited in Paris were bought by Napoleon III and by princess Mathilde.[3] He painted at the beginning of his career atmospheric pictures in a monochromatic palette of the riverside of the Rhone and the south of France. In 1870 he changed his style to use brilliant and striking color in his paintings but he still continued to make charcoal drawings as well as small etchings of landscapes in the Barbizon style.[4]

As an etcher, he had a distinct influence on the American artist, Stephen Parrish.[5]

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  Le Soir aux Martiguese (1850)
• 
  Le Haut du bois des roches (Rossillon) (1870)
• 
  The Source of the Albarine
  (ca 1870)
• 
  Landscape with Orchard
  (by 1898)
• 
  A Gorge de Loup, 1863, etching (National Gallery of Art)
• 
  A Fisherman in a Wooded Pond at Evening, 1887, etching with monotype wiping on wove paper, plate: 31 x 46.5 cm (12 3/16 x 18 5/16 in.) (National Gallery of Art)
• 
  At Venice, 1878, etching on thin laid paper, plate: 19.7 x 28 cm (7 3/4 x 11 in.) (National Gallery of Art)
• 
  Barque de Pecheurs, 1874, etching on laid paper, overall: 13.9 x 22.4 cm (5 1/2 x 8 13/16 in.) (National Gallery of Art)

• Works by Adolphe Appian at the National Gallery of Art