TANGUY, YVES

born Jan. 5, 1900, Paris, France died Jan. 15, 1955, Waterbury, Conn., U.S. French-born American painter who made a highly individual contribution to Surrealism. After sailing with the merchant marine in his youth, Tanguy in 1922 returned to Paris, where he lived a Bohemian life and searched for a vocation. In 1923 a painting by Giorgio de Chirico that he saw in an art gallery made such a strong impression on him that he immediately took up painting. He joined the Surrealists in 1925, and he subsequently participated in all the Surrealists' major exhibitions. He visited the United States in 1939 and settled there, becoming a U.S. citizen in 1948. Though he had no formal art training, Tanguy had found his own unique style of painting by 1927. His paintings depict groups of strange, unidentifiable objects that resemble marine invertebrates or sculpturesque rock formations. These ambiguous forms are painted with smooth, painstaking detail and are set in barren, brightly lit landscapes that have an infinite horizon and a timeless, dreamlike quality. After Tanguy resettled in the United States, the objects in his paintings took on a more metallic appearance. Tanguy's eerie and illogical paintings made him the artist most faithful to Surrealist precepts.