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Author: Scott_Burkett, Contributing Editor
| There isn't much information available in the public domain on Grun. In order to compile this information we spoke with many noted art experts, including several art history professors and the curators of several French museums. His early life is virtually unknown, although we do know many of his accomplishments, as they are well documented in the annals of the Paris Salons and periodicals of the period. One turn of the century publication characterized him as follows: "Whoever sees Grun once will always re-examine it in his spirit: a Frenchman with a beard and a legendary baldness; eyes strangely clear and penetrating, and under the sensual curving nose, a mouth gushing forth with quick wit and good banter." For Grun, life and art merged; he was a painter because he liked the life, and because he needed to express his clear feelings, coloured, alive of people and the things around them. As Theophilus Gautier said, Grun was "a man for whom the visible world exists". In the mid-to-late 1930s, Grun became stricken with Parkinson's disease, which served to isolate him from society, and greatly diminished his artistic abilities. He died in 1938. One of the last of the great Belle Epoch poster artists had been taken away from the world. His posters, full of life and of color, contributed largely to the rebirth of the lithography. With Cheret, whose name is inseparable in this field, Jules Alexandre Grun helped transform the scenic landscape of the Parisian streets at the turn of the century. Full and powerful, almost caricatural, and when he desired, delicate and exquisite. Grun, by his love of painting, and by the diversity of his gifts and subjects, was a complete artist. A Master. |
| Grun's Career in Posters and Illusration Like many of the poster artists of the time, Grun sold illustrations to magazines to earn a living. Dwelling as he did in the bohemian quarter of Paris, he frequented local cafes and cabarets, and that led him offering his services for interior decor and stage sets. Grun did multicolored decorations and backdrops for La Scala, le Concert Parisien, le Carillon, le Joyeux-Théâtre, and Decadent's Concert (among others). Happy with the results, the establishments began to commission him to produce posters for the shows they were staging. Grun "officially" began his poster designing career in 1892. This included works for many of the local Montmartre cabarets, shows, and revues. In addition, he did a number of posters in the product advertising arena. |
| He gained national notoriety for his work with color posters. Only the most famous Montmartre cabaret singers were shown in his posters. Grun created most of his posters at his Paris studio, located at 31 Boulevard Berthier.
They were printed by Impremerie Chaix, one of the largest printing firms in Paris. Jules Cheret, arguably the most prolific poster artist in history, was Chaix's artistic director. As such, there was a fierce competition between Cheret and Grun for the spotlight.
Au Violon, Poster for Cafe Riche
1897 |  |
 | Posters were where his natural talent asserted itself. He had an uncanny ability to catch the carefree spirit of Paris nightlife: the flirtatious coquettes out for some fun, concupiscent gentlemen in arduous pursuit of them, comical mishaps, and assorted street characters in quest for pleasure. Nearly all the women he showed in his posters are young, pretty and out on the town, well aware of their attractiveness and determined to enjoy it to the fullest. Three of his finer poster pieces were published in the turn of the century Maîtres de l'Affiche series from l'Impremerie Chaix. He also exhibited 10 posters at the now famous 1896 Poster Exhibition at Reims.
A small collection of Grun's posters may be found here in the WetCanvas! Reference Image Library. Image: Jules Grun, 1899, from "The Poster". The same photo appeared in the Album Mariani around the same time. |
| With his friends Abel Faivre, Charles Lucien Léandre, Théophile Steinlen, and Adolphe Willette, he took part in decorating the famed Tavern de Paris (Tavern of Paris), as well as the panels in the Casino at Monte Carlo. Perhaps Grun's most prolific work came as an illustrator. His illustrations appeared in many French periodicals, including La Caricature, La Plume (The Feather), Fin de Siecle (End of the Century), Le Courrier Francais (French Mail), Le Rire (The Laughter), La Sourire (The Smile), and Assiette au Beurre (Plate with Butter, no. 104 on "Their Mouths"). In 1912, he teamed with many of his friends, including Bofa, Brunelleschi, Cappiello, Faivre, and Sem, to publish an Album de Luxe (actually published by the Society of Cartoon Artists or Humoristes). |
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