Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Orovida Pissarro, the only child of Lucien and Esther Pissarro, was the first woman in the Pissarro family to become a professional artist and the first Pissarro of her generation to take up painting. Born in Epping, England, in 1893, she lived and worked predominantly in London, where she was a prominent member of several British arts clubs and societies.
Orovida first learned to paint in the Impressionist style from her father and, after a brief period of formal study with Walter Sickert in 1913, she renounced formal art schooling.
Throughout her career, Orovida always remained outside mainstream British art movements. Much to Lucien's disappointment, she soon turned away from naturalistic painting and developed an unusual style that combined elements of Japanese, Chinese, Persian and Indian art. Her rejection of Impressionism, which, for the Pissarro family, was a way of life, and her simultaneous decision to drop her famous last name and use simply Orovida as a nom de peintre, reflected a desire for independence and distance from the family legacy, of which she nevertheless remained proud.
Orovida's most distinctive works are her paintings from the 1920s and 1930s in gouache (she called her mixture body color) and tempera, applied in thin, delicate washes to silk, linen, paper or gold leaf and embellished with brocade borders. These elegant and richly decorative works generally depict non-Western subjects, for example: Mongolian horseback riders, African dancers and Persian princes, often engaged in activities such as dancing or hunting rituals.
The second half of Orovida's painting career is marked by a dramatic change in both style and subject matter. In the mid-1940s, she began to embrace contemporary subjects from everyday life and returned to a more naturalistic style. Her new style was more suited to oils, and thus, she returned to that medium.
Over the course of her life, Orovida was aware of the mixed blessing of having famous artists in the family; not only a grandfather and father but also four uncles, and towards the end of her life, she was instrumental in developing the Pissarro family archive that her mother had established at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford.
(Biography provided by Stern Pissarro Gallery)
1910s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1920s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1930s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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20th Century Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1920s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1910s Post-Impressionist Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Paper, Etching
1930s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1920s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1920s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1920s Post-Impressionist Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1920s Post-Impressionist Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1910s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Aquatint, Etching
1940s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1920s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Aquatint, Etching
1930s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1920s Art Deco Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1910s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1920s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1950s Post-Impressionist Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1930s Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1940s Post-Impressionist Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Etching, Watercolor
21st Century and Contemporary Other Art Style Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Etching, Paper
1980s Symbolist Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Paper, Etching
2010s Contemporary Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Paper, Etching
Mid-20th Century Post-Impressionist Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Lithograph
1970s Contemporary Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Aquatint, Etching
1960s Surrealist Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Etching, Paper
1990s Contemporary Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
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1970s Contemporary Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Ink, Paper, Etching
Early 19th Century Naturalistic Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Etching, Engraving
1780s Pre-Raphaelite Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Intaglio, Laid Paper, Etching
1830s Victorian Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Gold Leaf
1850s Victorian Orovida Pissarro Prints and Multiples
Intaglio, Laid Paper, Etching