Maurice Estève On Sale

Maurice Estève was born May 2, 1904 in Culan in the Cher where he spent his childhood with his grandparents. He joined them in 1913 in Paris, where he discovered the Louvre Museum (he is particularly impressed by the Battle of San Romano by Paolo Ucello). Returning to Culan for the summer, he stayed there during the war years, began painting as early as 1915. He lived in Paris again from 1918. Apprentice to a typographer then to a modern furniture design studio, he followed Drawing evening class, discovers in 1919 the painting of Cézanne. Back in Paris he attended Montparnasse the free workshop of the Academy Colarossi. Marked until then by the painting of the Primitives and the work of Cézanne, it passed temporarily in 1927 the influence of surrealism, including Giorgio de Chirico. He presents his first solo exhibition in 1930 before becoming interested in film and directing. On the advice of Braque who participates, he is asked in 1936 to exhibit in Stockholm with Matisse, Picasso, Juan Gris and Fernand Léger. He participated the following year in the realization of the wall decorations of Robert and Sonia Delaunay for the pavilions of the Aviation and Railways at the Universal Exhibition of Paris. Estève, who works regularly during the summer in Culan, makes lithographs, regularly practices watercolor but also charcoal, monotype, collage. In 1970, he received the Grand Prix National des Arts. From 1981 are organized several retrospectives of his work. The City of Bourges decided to present all the works (more than a hundred) which the painter donated to him in 1985 in the Hotel des Echevins, restored with the assistance of the Historic Monuments and the Direction of the Museums of France to become the "Estève Museum", inaugurated in 1987. Estève moved permanently to Culan in 1995. He died on June 27, 2001.

Decorating with fine art prints — whether they’re figurative prints, abstract prints or another variety — has always been a practical way of bringing a space to life as well as bringing works by an artist you love into your home.

Pursued in the 1960s and ’70s, largely by Pop artists drawn to its associations with mass production, advertising, packaging and seriality, as well as those challenging the primacy of the Abstract Expressionist brushstroke, printmaking was embraced in the 1980s by painters and conceptual artists ranging from David Salle and Elizabeth Murray to Adrian Piper and Sherrie Levine.

Printmaking is the transfer of an image from one surface to another. An artist takes a material like stone, metal, wood or wax, carves, incises, draws or otherwise marks it with an image, inks or paints it and then transfers the image to a piece of paper or other material.

Fine art prints are frequently confused with their more commercial counterparts. After all, our closest connection to the printed image is through mass-produced newspapers, magazines and books, and many people don’t realize that even though prints are editions, they start with an original image created by an artist with the intent of reproducing it in a small batch. Fine art prints are created in strictly limited editions — 20 or 30 or maybe 50 — and are always based on an image created specifically to be made into an edition.

Many people think of revered Dutch artist Rembrandt as a painter but may not know that he was a printmaker as well. His prints have been preserved in time along with the work of other celebrated printmakers such as Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dalí and Andy Warhol. These fine art prints are still highly sought after by collectors.

“It’s another tool in the artist’s toolbox, just like painting or sculpture or anything else that an artist uses in the service of mark making or expressing him- or herself,” says International Fine Print Dealers Association (IFPDA) vice president Betsy Senior, of New York’s Betsy Senior Fine Art, Inc.

Because artist’s editions tend to be more affordable and available than his or her unique works, they’re more accessible and can be a great opportunity to bring a variety of colors, textures and shapes into a space.

For tight corners, select small fine art prints as opposed to the oversized bold piece you’ll hang as a focal point in the dining area. But be careful not to choose something that is too big for your space. And feel free to lean into it if need be — not every work needs picture-hanging hooks. Leaning a larger fine art print against the wall behind a bookcase can add a stylish installation-type dynamic to your living room. (Read more about how to arrange wall art here.)

Find fine art prints for sale on 1stDibs today.