Nancy, Lorraine land fertile with illustrious artists, figures who expressed and gave shape to the major and minor arts, the so-called "decorative arts". In 1846, on May 4, under the sign of Taurus, a star rises, an esthete is born: Emile Gallé, who in life gave tangible signs of mastery which was later defined by critics as Art Nouveau. Read the full biography
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Nancy, Lorraine land fertile with illustrious artists, figures who expressed and gave shape to the major and minor arts, the so-called "decorative arts". In 1846, on May 4, under the sign of Taurus, a star rises, an esthete is born: Emile Gallé, who in life gave tangible signs of mastery which was later defined by critics as Art Nouveau. He will be the undisputed creator, who is paralleled in historical importance by Antonin Daum, Louis Confort Tiffany and René Lalique, three illustrious masters of glass, and continues with the cabinet-making works of the famous Louis Majorelle. Emile Gallé has always drawn and planned his works but never created them personally with the exception of when he attended high school, he painted ceramics and polychrome enamel glass for his father Charles, also exercising his hand by copying landscape and sea scenes animated by figures by the famous Lorraine engraver Jacques Callot (1592-1632). He was an admirer and influenced by the painter Tokuso Takashima who, having settled in Nancy, brought him a breath of art from distant Japan. Emile Gallé follows his artistic path to become "the industrialist" ceramics, cabinet making, glass, spread throughout the world. Its establishments, located in Nancy, rue de La Garenne, have almost 400 workers, including designers, draftsmen, the most important of whom was Victor Prouvé, then blowers, engravers, decorators, ceramists, cabinetmakers, while the administrative part was made up from 35 expert comptable. The cabinet-making ateliers date back to the year 1885, giving life to the new style, which stands out for its sumptuous "marqueterie" of local and exotic wood essences. In glass there are many processing techniques undertaken, lyrical variations for unique specimens: an example is the disturbing and famous Les Coprins lamp from 1902, which was auctioned in New York in 1990 for 1.4 billion lire. (There are 4 examples of this lamp but with variations). Furthermore, on 13 December 2018, again in New York, at Christie's, the "Giglio" glass vase from 1900-1903 was sold for €392,000. Emile died of leukemia in 1904 and his wife Henriette Grim temporarily took over the management of the three factories. Critics, poets and intellectuals suggest that a "star" be added to the glass, next to the signature, to commemorate a great French figure, a star that will be engraved as a cameo from 1904 to 1906 (among the French stars, perhaps the first of all Joan of Arc, 1412-1431, famous heroine, French patriot). The firm did not survive the crisis of 1929, Gallé's sons-in-law, who had only successfully carried out glass manufacturing, suffered their definitive collapse in 1930. The legendary Gallé signature goes through dark times; we must go back to the year 1954, when the most important collection of Gallé glass, which belonged to the king of Farouk of Egypt, was put up for auction. Interest in the works is reawakened, the market restarts, the retrospectives in private museums and galleries in Europe, America and Japan overlap: the legendary Emile Gallé, with his graceful works, lives again.
