Kneeling Nude

1904–1907

A studio with André Mare; “My Mother's Garden”

In 1904–1907 Léger shares a studio with his fellow countryman André Mare, working for an architect and as a retoucher for a photographer. He begins to work seriously as a painter only at 25; from this period, marked by the influence of Impressionism, survives “My Mother's Garden” (1905), one of the few early paintings he did not later destroy.

1907

The 1907 Cézanne exhibition and a turn to geometry

Cézanne's posthumous exhibition of 1907 (at the Salon d'Automne by some accounts, at the Salon des Indépendants by others) strongly influences Léger: a new emphasis on drawing and geometry appears in his work.

1908–1909

La Ruche and Montparnasse: Archipenko, Lipchitz, Chagall, Rousseau

In 1908 Léger settles in La Ruche (other accounts have him moving to Montparnasse in 1909) and meets Alexander Archipenko, Laurens and Jacques Lipchitz, later Chaïm Soutine, Marc Chagall and Robert Delaunay and their guests (Max Jacob, Apollinaire, Raynal, Blaise Cendrars); some become his friends. In 1909 he also meets Henri Rousseau, “le Douanier”, whose frontal compositions, firm contours and smoothly blended colours his own work of the 1920s frequently recalls.