The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (426 page)

Salon des Indépendants
.

Name given to the annual exhibitions held in Paris by the Société des Artistes Indépendants, an association formed in 1884 by
Seurat
,
Signac
, and other artists in opposition to the official
Salon
. There was no selection committee and any artist could exhibit on payment of a fee. The Salon des Indépendants became the main showcase of the
Post-Impressionists
and was a major art event in Paris up to the beginning of the First World War.

 
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Salon des Refusés
.

Exhibition held in Paris in 1863 to show work that had been refused by the selection committee of the official
Salon
. In that year there were especially strong protests from artists whose work had been rejected, so the emperor Napoleon III ordered this special exhibition. It drew huge crowds, who came mainly to ridicule, and
Manet's
Déjeuner sur l'herbe
was subjected to furious abuse. Other major artists represented included
Cézanne
, Camille
Pissarro
, and
Whistler
. In spite of the unfavourable reaction to the works shown there, the Salon des Refusés was of great significance in undermining the prestige of the official Salon. After this, artists began to organize their own exhibitions (notably the
Impressionists
in 1874) and art dealers became of increasing importance. The Salon des Refusés is thus regarded as a turning point in the history of art and 1863 is, in the words of Alan Bowness (
Modern European Art
, 1972), ‘the most convenient date from which to begin any history of modern painting’.

 
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(1510–63).
Florentine
Mannerist
painter, a pupil of
Andrea del Sarto
. He adopted his name from his patron Cardinal Giovanni Salviati , with whom he went to Rome
c.
1530 and for whom he painted the work that established his reputation there—the fresco of the
Visitation
(1538) in S. Giovanni Decollato. In 1539 he travelled to Venice, and from the 1540s led a restless life, working mainly in Florence and Rome but also visiting Fontainebleau in 1556–7. He was one of the leading fresco decorators of his day, specializing in learned and elaborate multi-figure compositions, typically Mannerist in their artificiality and abstruseness, and similar in style to those of his friend
Vasari
(although Salviati was an artist of higher calibre). His finest works are perhaps the frescos on the story of the ancient tyrant Furius Camillus (1543–5) in the Sala dell' Udienza of the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence, intended as an allegory of Cosimo de'
Medici's
reign. Salviati also made designs for tapestries and was noted for his portraits, which were Florentine in their direct characterization but north Italian in their richness of colour.
Giuseppe Salviati
(
c.
1520–
c.
1575) was his pupil. He was born Giuseppe Porta, but borrowed his master's borrowed name. He worked mainly in Venice, painting numerous altarpieces and also decorations for civic buildings.

 
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(1936– ).
Greek-born sculptor and experimental artist who settled in the USA in 1948 and became an American citizen in 1955. His work has been extremely varied in scale, medium, and approach. At the end of the 1950s he was producing figures from rags dipped in plaster and pastels combining
Surrealist
fantasy and
Pop art
iconography. In 1959 he took part in
Kaprow's
first
happening
. During the 1960s he developed an original style in the use of mixed media, employing thousands of pins, yarns, nails, etc., and he has experimented with
assemblages
of diverse objects. He experimented also with light and reflection, notably in his
Mirrored Room
(1966), an
environment
walled with mirrors in which the spectator was reflected endlessly. Perhaps his best-known works are his ‘Autopolaroids’—photographs of the most intimate parts of his own body that he began making in 1970 and which brought him considerable notoriety.

 
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(1531/2–88).
Spanish painter of Portuguese parentage, principally a portraitist. He studied under Anthonis
Mor
in Flanders in the early 1550s and by 1555 was working at the court of Philip II of Spain, where he was to remain for the rest of his life, achieving great success and becoming a personal favourite of the king, who was godfather to his two daughters. His dignified and sober style was strongly influenced by Mor, but was more sensuous, showing his admiration for
Titian
, and it is regarded as marking the beginning of the great tradition of Spanish formal portraiture. He also painted religious works, but these are much less distinguished.

 
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