1848 -1892 · Philadelphia, New York and triumph of trompe l'oeil

Worn wood, crumpled paper and hanging violins make William Michael Harnett the great illusionist of American still life.

William Michael Harnett was born in Clonakilty, Ireland, in 1848 and died in New York in 1892. His family emigrated to Philadelphia while still a child. Forced to work at a young age, he learned metal engraving and became a skilled craftsman, specializing in monograms and silverware ornaments. The chisel taught him the precision, patience and attention to reflections that would nourish all his painting. He took evening classes at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, then in New York at the Cooper Union and the National Academy of Design. Around the mid-1870s, he gradually abandoned commercial engraving for still life. Harnett not only represents objects: he constructs visual traps where the border between the thing and its image becomes uncertain. After European stays, notably in Munich, he developed his most ambitious compositions. In Still Life with Violin, the instrument, the bow, the score, the piccolo and the small metal objects really seem attached to a wooden door. The papers rise, the strings tighten, the nails cast their shadows and the small metal objects seem to be attached to a wooden door. The papers rise, the strings tighten, the nails cast their shadows and the half-open door suggests a depth behind the shot. The Old Violin further pushes this illusion: the weathered wood, the strings, the strings stretch, the nails cast their shadows and the half-open door suggests a depth behind the shot. The Old Violin still pushes this illusion: the weathered wood, the strings, the nails cast their shadows and the half-open door suggests a depth behind the shot. The Old Violin pushes this illusion further: the weathered wood, the strings, the nails cast their shadows and the half-open door suggests a depth behind the shot. The Old Violin pushes this illusion further: the weathered wood, the strings, the nails cast their shadows and the half-open door suggests a depth behind the shot. The Old Violin pushes this illusion further simple feats. Their wear, silent music and traces of manipulation tell of an absent human presence. Harnett prefers books, instruments, pipes, coins and containers marked by time to dazzling bouquets. Very popular with middle-class collectors, he became the most imitated still life painter of his generation and influenced John Frederick Peto. His technique transforms the everyday object into an enigma about the perception, memory and value of manual labor. The "William Michael Harnett" selection notably compares Still Life with Violin and The Old Violin.

Harnett does not copy the object: he organizes enough clues for the eye to hesitate, then discovers in illusion the trace of time and the hand.