The Dreamlike Eroticism of Alain Bonnefoit

The French artist Alain Bonnefoit (born in 1937 in Paris) was once described as ‘the painter of Venuses’. After exploring his rich oeuvre overflowing with sensuous lithographs and occasional watercolours I must agree. Bonnefoit was born in Montmartre, in the heart of the artistic community, the place where so many erotic paintings were born in the past, from Manet’s Olympia to Modigliani’s nudes, so perhaps it was fitting for Bonnefoit to continue the long lineage of sensuous masterpieces. Bonnefoit studied at the École des Arts Appliqués and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris (1953–1957), then he studied engraving and sculpture in Brussels at the Royal Academy. He also trained under the sculptor Antoniucci Volti in Paris in the early 1960s and it was Volti, of course – an Italian – who inspired him to take the female form as his primary subject.

Fig.1  Alain Bonnefoit, Nude Female

Fig.2  Alain Bonnefoit, Nude Female, Litograph

Fig.3  Alain Bonnefoit, Nude Woman, litograph

Fig.4  Alain Bonnefoit, Nu Pensif

Veils of Softness

Bonnefoit’s art stands at a delicate crossroad between sensuality and reverie, between the immediate heat of the body and the timeless haze of a dream. Known above all for his female nudes, Bonnefoit cultivates an aesthetic that resists the vulgar or the overtly carnal; instead, he clothes his eroticism in veils of softness, with a special emphasis on line and mood. His works often feature women suspended in a liminal state; not quite here, not entirely imagined, bodies rendered with tenderness and curves that seem to float rather than press against reality. In so many paintings, Bonnefoit’s line is always graceful and fluid, evoking the sweep of calligraphy. Take a look at examples in Fig.4. and Fig.8.; in one confident yet soft line Bonnefoit captures the line of a female body; the arm, the stomach, the curves, the line is always very seductive and really it is hard to look away. They suggest form without imprisoning it; the same way as desire itself suggests without fully revealing. In this way Bonnefoit’s way of painting the curve of the female body reminds me of Modigliani’s nudes. The same tender lyricism, the same poetic sense of fragility, the same airiness I find in both. Bonnefoit’s line is an artwork in and of itself, it brings to mind some dazzling calligraphy and its beauty is almost self-sufficient. 

Fig.5  Alain Bonnefoit, Josephine, 1969

Fig.6  Alain Bonnefoit, Melancholy, 1976, original lithograph Signed and numbered

Fig.7  Alain Bonnefoit, Nude of a red-haired woman in a bathrobe

Fig.8  Alain Bonnfait, Reveuse, 1973

In the extended Premium edition of the article an extensive analysis of the aesthetics in Bonnefoit's paintings, an interesting comparison with the photographs of David Hamilton, highlighting details in the artist's work, and MUCH more...!!

Click HERE for an article on the bass-relief of the female body in the paintings of Alain Bonnefoit

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