Émile Friant (French painter) 1863 - 1932
Emile Friant began his education at the Nancy Ecole des Beaux-Arts and displayed his work at the local Salon since the age of 15. He continued his studies in Paris in the studio of Alexandre Cabanel and was runner up for the Prix de Rome at the age of 20. As a naturalist painter Emile Friant essentially creates portraits and daily life scenes. His paintings draw their snapshot characteristics from photography. After his success at the 1889 World Fair, in which he was awarded a gold medal for La Toussaint, Emile Friant received numerous commissions for portraits of Nancy and American figures. His contribution to the decorative arts is small compared to the contributions of Camille Martin or Victor Prouvé. However, he designed, in collaboration with Camille Martin, a furniture set with a Don Quixote theme for Louis Majorelle and then designed a bookbinding for René Wiener illustrating “The guillotine and the executors or arrested criminals during the Revolution.” He was a member of the Ecole de Nancy Board of Management since 1901 and taught at the Nancy Ecole des Beaux-Arts in 1906.
