Artist Eugene Alexix Girardet (French artist)

Artist Eugène Alexis Girardet

 Eugène-Alexis Girardet was born in Paris on 31 May 1853 into a family whose livelihood had long been based on painting, engraving and lithography. Girardet attempts to capture the images of North Africa accurately, emphasizing what he sees rather than what his academic training has taught him that he should see. Shoemakers Children of 1884 is a case in point.  The setting is a modest workshop with the cobbler seated at his bench as he focuses on the task at hand.  His children sit on a low stone bench in front of the workshop, looking rather bored as they stare into space while their father toils at his chosen craft.  This is not a sentimental image, nor is it a precise anthropological illustration; instead it is a detached depiction of daily activity in an Arab family, painted in a loose naturalistic style. Throughout the last two decades of the nineteenth century, Girardet continued his journeys to North Africa and the Middle East.  In 1898, he traveled to Egypt and Palestine, painting numerous scenes of Cairo and Jerusalem.  Stylistically his work showed increasing influence from the Impressionists with looser brushwork and growing attention to dappled and sparkling light effects.