The Eclectic Artists Who Created a New Reality in Modern Art

A glimpse into the avant-garde world of Les Nabis painters

Les Couturières (1890) by Édouard Vuillard. Oil on canvas. 47.5 × 57.5 cm. Private collection. Image source Wikimedia Commons

How powerful can art be? And what of the artist — how deeply can their powers of perception penetrate into the nature of reality?

Is it possible to find a creative temperament that pierces more acutely into personal intuitions and transcendent truths?

Such questions fired the imaginations of a group of French artists working in the closing years of the 19th century. This pioneering collective, though short-lived, would leave a profound and lasting impact on the world of modern art. They became known as Les Nabis.

Secret society

Members of Les Nabis. Photo from left to right: Ker-Xavier Roussel (1867–1944), Edouard Vuillard (1868–1940), Romain Coolus (1868–1952), and Felix Vallotton (1865–1925) by Louis-Alfred Natanson taken in 1899. Image source Wikimedia Commons

Les Nabis (pronounced lay-na-bee) is derived from the Hebrew word n’vi’ím, meaning “prophets”.

With more than a hint of theatricality, they formed a secret society in a studio on the Boulevard du Montparnasse in Paris and convened there once a week, beginning each meeting with a recital of their own mantra:

“Sounds, colours, and words have a miraculously expressive power beyond all…