Adolphe Valette 1876-1942

Male Nude

Graphite on Paper
24 x 17¼ ins (60.96 x 43.82 cms)
Signed - A Valette

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Provenance

Provenance: Private collection, UK

Exhibition History

Exhibition: Manchester City Art Gallery, Adolphe Valette, 6th October - 14th November 1976

General Notes

In 1905 L.S. Lowry started attending evening classes at the Manchester Municipal School of Art, it was here that he first met fellow student Adolphe Valette, Lowry was 17 and Valette was 29. Valette's talent as an artist and draughtsman were quickly spotted and he was offered a full time teaching post. Lowry was to attend many of Valette's life drawing classes over the years and he later acknowledged the debt he owed to this talented Frenchman. Valette, through his teaching gave Lowry the artistic knowledge regarding line and composition which he would later use to great effect in his own drawings and paintings of the northern industrial scene.

Lowry was to attend these classes for 15 years, and although he reached a reasonable level of skill, he was never able to achieve the high standards of draughtsmanship of his teacher Valette. This Male Nude drawing is an example of how skilled a draughtsman was and it was one of the drawings chosen for his retrospective exhibition at Manchester City Art Gallery in 1976.