Jean Metzinger - Early Life

Early Life

Jean Metzinger came from a prominent military family. His great-grandfather, Nicolas Metzinger (18 May 1769 - 1838 ), Captain in the 1st Artillery Regiment on Horse, and Knight of the Legion of Honour, had served under Napoleon Bonaparte. Following the early death of his father, Eugène Francois Metzinger, Jean pursued interests in mathematics, music and painting. By 1900 he was a student at the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Nantes, working under Hippolyte Touront, a well-known portrait painter who taught an academic, conventional style of painting. Jean Metzinger, however, was interested in the current trends in painting.

Metzinger sent three paintings to the Salon des Indépendants in 1903, and subsequently moved to Paris with the proceeds from their sale. From the age of 20, Metzinger supported himself as a professional painter. He exhibited regularly in Paris from 1903, participating in the first Salon d'Automne the same year and taking part in a group show with Raoul Dufy, Lejeune and Torent, at the gallery run by Berthe Weill (1865–1951). Metzinger exhibited at Berthe Weill's gallery again in 1907, with Robert Delaunay, in 1908 with Marie Laurencin, and 1910 with Derain, Rouault and Kees van Dongen. It is at Berthe Weill's that he would meet Max Jacob for the first time. Berthe Weill was also the first Parisian art dealer to sell works of Pablo Picasso (1906). Along with Picasso and Metzinger, she helped discover Matisse, Derain, Amedeo Modigliani and Utrillo.

In 1904 Metzinger showed several paintings, again at the Salon des Indépendants and the Salon d’Automne (where he would show regularly throughout his life). In 1906 Metzinger met Albert Gleizes at the Salon des Indépendants, and visited his studio in Courbevoie several day later. In 1907, at Max Jacob's room, Metzinger met Guillaume Krotowsky, who already signed his works Guillaume Apollinaire. In 1908 a poem by Metzinger, Parole sur la lune, was published in Guillaume Apollinaire's La Poésie Symboliste.

Also in 1908, Metzinger exhibited at Galerie Notre-Dame-des-Champs (Paris) with Georges Braque, Sonia Delaunay, André Derain, Raoul Dufy, Auguste Herbin, Jules Pascin and Pablo Picasso. At the 1909 Salon d’Automne Metzinger exhibited along side Constantin Brancusi, Henri Le Fauconnier and Fernand Léger.

Jean Metzinger married Lucie Soubiron in Paris on 30 December of the same year.