
Denis, MauriceFrench, 1870–1943May one see it?
Paris, France
The owner is known. Whether it is on view today, the museum does not say, and we were not trained to guess.
1888 · Education
Académie Julian
1888
Meeting Sérusier and Bonnard at the Académie Julian
At the Académie Julian he befriended Paul Sérusier and Pierre Bonnard, and through Bonnard met Vuillard, Ranson and Roussel — the future core of the Nabis group.
1889
Revelation at the Gauguin exhibition at the Café Volpini
He was captivated by the exhibition of works by Gauguin and other artists at a café near the World's Fair in Paris; he later called it "an astonishment, followed by a revelation."
1890
Founding of the Nabis group
Together with his fellow students from the Académie Julian he formed the artistic group Les Nabis (from the Hebrew for "prophet"); Denis is considered its most prominent theorist.
August 1890
Manifesto in Art et Critique: the "flat surface"
He published in the journal Art et Critique his famous essay with the words defining a picture as "essentially a flat surface covered with colors assembled in a certain order" — a thesis that became part of the foundation of modernism.
October 1890
Meeting Marthe Meurier
He met Marthe Meurier, his future wife and the principal model of his paintings; from June 1891 their romance is documented in detail in his diary.