By Lambe Lamis 
French Symbolist painter, printmaker, draughtsman, and pastellist Bertrand-Jean Redon or Odilon Redon (April 20, 1840 – July 06, 1916) was an eminent frontrunner of ‘Post-Impressionism’ and ‘Symbolism.’ He was only 10 when he gained a drawing prize at school. Odilon commenced finding out drawing formally at 15, but had to switch to architecture on his father’s insistence. He was again to painting, when he unsuccessful to move the entrance for architecture, at École des Beaux-Arts, Paris. The creator of the “Portrait of Violette Heymann,” Redon, examined etching and lithography below Rodolphe Bresdin, until his artistic profession yet again experienced to choose a split when he joined military in the Franco-Prussian War, in 1870.
The 12 months 1878 gained Odilon recognition, with his creations the ‘Guardian Spirit of the Waters’ and his 1st album of lithographs, ‘Dans le Rêve’ in 1879. In 1890s, he started off employing pastels and oils, which was greatly found in his is effective for the rest of his lifetime. He included a few of etchings and lithographs catalogs to his rely, later on in life. Odilon’s will work have been massively imaginative, which ranged correct from a human headed spider to quaking ground. His well-known will work bundled ‘Spirit of the Forest’ (1880), ‘Cactus Man’ (1881), ‘The Crying Spider’ (1881), ‘The Buddha’ (1904), and the “Portrait of Violette Heymann.”
The “Portrait of Violette Heymann,” created in the course of the final yrs of Redon’s lifestyle in 1910, was one particular an immensely imaginative perform. Measuring 72 cm x 92 cm, this pastel get the job done displays a younger female, Violette Heymann, surrounded by numerous, intensely coloured, blooming, and rather unfinished flowers all around. To match up with the concept ‘Violette,’ Odilon has created an ample use of violet shade. Violette is revealed sideways, sitting down on a chair, which is supporting just her back again, when her neck and head remain unsupported. She seems to be passive, owing to her expressionless flat deal with. Her costume is also really simple with out substantially elaboration and fashion. She is a wearing a white colored, large neck interior, with a greenish-blue higher possessing golden border. Her black hair is shoulder size and is pinned at her back.
Odilon Redon described his performs as ambiguous and indefinable. He describes, “I have often, as an training and as sustenance, painted just before an item down to the smallest incidents of its visual physical appearance but the day still left me unfortunate and with an insatiate thirst. The upcoming working day I allow the other source run, that of imagination, by way of the recollection of the sorts and I was then reassured and appeased.” Reflecting his individual thinking and psyche through his work, Redon attempted to “location the visible at the service of the invisible.” The identical ambiguity is mirrored in Violette’s expression, owing to which Odilon’s this artwork generally gathered combined reactions. The “Portrait of Violette Heymann” is presently exhibited at the Museum of Art at Cleveland, Ohio.