Olive, the son of a wine merchant, was born in Marseille's Saint-Martin neighbourhood. Étienne Cornellier, a decorator, encouraged him to register at École des beaux-arts de Marseille where he studied under the guidance of Joanny Rave. There he received several awards including, in 1871, the live model class's first prize. While training as a decorator, he painted many scenes of Marseille, its Vieux-Port, its islands, and its seashore. In 1874 he travelled to Italy, mainly to Genoa and Venice. He occasionally participated in some of Provence's exhibitions at the time. Although he was relatively little-known outside of France – unlike his Marseillais fellow citizen Adolphe Monticelli – Olive has become one of Provence's most iconic painters and an emblematic figure of the French marine art movement. While proud of his Marseille origins, the introverted Olive long remained doubtful of his own painting talent. His favourite themes were the sea, seashores and ports. His views of le Vieux-Port, in which the rendering of light compares to that of Félix Ziem's paintings, are especially well-known, together with his calanques (a local term for cliff-edged inlets along the coast between Marseille and La Ciotat). His views of le Vieux-Port depict it as seen from offshore, not from the ground. His still lifes, the early ones frugal, the later ones more opulent and varied, generally focus on Provence fruits and ornamental tableware.
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