Juliette Cambier (Ziane) was Born in Brussels (Saint-Gilles) in 1879. In the beginning she was a self-taught painter enjoying some technical advice of her husband, Louis Gustave Cambier (1874-1949) who was painter and also a sculptor.
With him, she went to Paris in 1914 and studied at the Acacdémie Ranson with teachers as Maurice Denis, Edouard Vuillard and other important artists.
Juliette Cambier would be akin to Octave Maus, secretary and leader of the ‘Circle des XX’. He appreciated her talent and introduced her to ‘La Libre Esthétique’ which took over the XX. At the last show organized by this group in 1914, she exposed still lifes and landscapes. Criticism praised the artist with an impulsive temperament and a nature stripped of any artifice.
By the time war broke out, the Cambier moved to Cagnes. Louis Gustave was hired by the Academy of Fine Arts in Nice to direct the sculpture class. Juliette attended the workshop of Auguste Renoir who appreciated, encouraged and advised her.
The couple became also friends with Henri Matisse and Paul Signac, who wrote the preface of the common exhibition catalog they organized at the Artistic Circle of Nice in 1918.
The text which was extensively reproduced in the French press, caused a scandal, because of criticism towards the official and academic French art .
Back in Belgium in 1920, Juliette Cambier exhibited regularly in various Galleries in Brussels, Antwerp and participated at the Salon des Indépendants in Paris. She is also associated with exhibitions organized by the Belgian State in Switzerland, Venice, Prague and Stockholm.
Her first exhibition in Brussels, with the Galerie du Studio (Isy Brachot) in 1921, also featured works from her husband and the catalog published on this occasion, reproduced, once again, the famous text of Signac.
Juliette Cambier has been practicing landscape, portrait, still life and especially flowers . It is a very spontaneous art, with color research and rare harmonies.
She died in Ixelles (Brussels) in 1963.