Yves Tanguy

Yves Tanguy: Self-taught, from sailor to painter

Yves Tanguy was born in Paris on 5 January 1900. The son of a retired naval officer, he enlisted in the merchant navy after leaving school and travelled to Africa, England and South America, during which time, he became friends with the poet Jacques Prévert (1900-1977), who was the same age as him. The freedom he sought in vain at sea, however, he finally found in painting: At the age of 22, he saw two paintings by the Italian painter Giorgio de Chirico (1888-1978) in the window of the Galerie Paul Guillaume in Paris from a bus, one of which was the key surrealist work The Child's Brain, created in 1914. Deeply impressed, Yves Tanguy began ashort time later to paint in watercolours himself, but did not complete any proper training and remained a self-taught artist for the rest of his life. He found his first motifs in the numerous Parisian cafés, and during these years, temporarily shared an apartment with his friend Prévert and fellow poet Georges Duhamel (1884-1966).

Tanguy found an artistic home in Surrealism

Yves Tanguy initially painted in the Dadaist style, but came into close contact with the Surrealists around André Breton (1896-1966) through his housemates Duhamel and Prévert. Breton became Yves Tanguy's most important mentor and influenced his painting style for the rest of his life. The initial influences of Dadaism, Expressionism, Cubism and New Objectivity gave way in 1925 to his own style, characterised by Breton's classical Surrealism. Yves Tanguy cultivated a lively exchange with the important artists of Surrealism: Salvador Dalí (1904-1989), Max Ernst (1891-1976), André Masson (1896-1987) and René Magritte (1898-1967) were among his regular friends, although they overshadowed his own artistic work at the time. In 1927, Yves Tanguy had his first solo exhibition at the Galerie Surréaliste in Paris, and that same year, he married his first wife Jeannette Ducrocq (1896-1977), whom he divorced in 1940 to marry the artist Kay Sage (1898-1963), and with whom he emigrated to the USA after the outbreak of the Second World War.

Dreamy landscapes and visions of doom

Yves Tanguy cultivated a unique style with a high recognition value, characterised in particular by expansive, abstract landscapes. The influence of Giorgio de Chirico clearly shines through in his early work in particular, while echoes of Salvador Dalí also became apparent later, from whom he differed above all in his omission of a horizon. After his emigration to the USA, the visionary dream landscapes increasingly gave way to motifs that could be interpreted as critical commentaries on armament and war in the wake of the horrors of the Second World War. Yves Tanguy's surrealist style of painting also influenced several younger artists, including Roberto Matta (1911-2002), Wolfgang Paalen (1905-1959), Esteban Francés (1913-1976) and the painter Toyen (1902-1980). His last years, however, were coined by alcohol and aggressive outbursts towards his wife.

Yves Tanguy died in Waterbury, Connecticut in the USA on 15 January 1955.