La crique (the cove)
Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop.
1959.
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Les beaux jours (fine weather)
Aubusson tapestry woven in the Henry workshop. With signed label, n°2/6. Circa 1980. -
Le dindon (the turkey)
Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With label. Circa 1960. -
Le sultan (the sultan)
Lurçat’s artistic production was immense : it is however his role as the renovator of the art of tapestry design which ensures his lasting renown. As early as 1917, he started producing works on canvas, then in the 20’s and 30’s, he worked with Marie Cuttoli. His first collaboration with the Gobelins workshop dates back to 1937, at the same time he discovered the tapestry of the Apocalypse which was essential in his decision to devote himself to tapestry design. He first tackled the technical aspects with François Tabard, then on his installation at Aubusson during the war, he established his technique : broad point, a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers. A huge production then follows (over 1000 cartoons) amplified by his desire to include his painter friends, the creation of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) and the collaboration with the art gallery La Demeure and Denise Majorel, and then by his role as a tireless advocate for the medium around the world. His tapestries reveal a pictorial world which is specifically decorative, with a very personal symbolic iconography : cosmogony (the sun, the planets, the zodiac, the four elements…) stylised vegetation, fauna (rams, cocks, butterflies, chimera …) standing out against a background without perspective (voluntarily different from painting) and, in his more ambitious work, designed as an invitation to share in a poetic (he sometimes weaves quotations into his tapestries) and philosophical (the grand themes are broached from the wartime period onwards) vision whose climax is the “Chant du Monde” (Song of the World) (Jean Lurçat Museum , ancien hôpital Saint Jean, Angers) which remained unfinished at his death. ‘Le Sultan’ is an inverted version of “Fanfares”, with changes to the detail of the rooster's plumage. Although the rooster is a leitmotif for Lurçat, it can take on different meanings: here, in glory, on a large scale (3.5 m²), it bears witness to the Victory of 1945 (note the tricolour allusions), it is a festive rooster, deployed in a profusion of coloured areas. Bibliography : Tapisseries de Jean Lurçat 1939-1957, Pierre Vorms Editeur, 1957 Exhibition Catalogue Lurçat, 10 ans après, Musée d'Art moderne de la ville de Paris, 1976 Exhibition catalogue Les domaines de Jean Lurçat, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, 1986 Symposium Jean Lurçat et la renaissance de la tapisserie in Aubusson, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie 1992 Exhibition Catalogue Dialogues avec Lurçat, Musées de Basse-Normandie, 1992 Exhibition catalogue Jean Lurçat, Donation Simone Lurçat, Académie des Beaux-Arts, 2004 Jean Lurçat, le chant du monde Angers 2007 Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. With signed label. Circa 1945. -
Les 2 écureuils (the 2 squirrels)
Tapestry woven by the de Wit workshop. With signed label. Circa 1960. -
Survol (flying over)
Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°5/6. 1974. It was in 1953 that Jean Picart le Doux proposed to Chaye to become his assistant and encouraged him to design tapestry cartoons : he would produce numerous bucolic cartoons, but also views of Normandy (Mont Saint Michel, Honfleur, regattas,...) whence he came. These compositions “as the bird flies” are typical of the artist. Bibliography : Simon Chaye tapisseries contemporaines, Editions Librairie des musées, 2014, ill. p.83 -
Mond und Wasser (Moon and Water)
Tapestry woven by the Münchener Gobelin Manufaktur. Circa 1970. -
Feuer und Wasser (Fire and Water)
Tapestry woven by the Münchener Gobelin Manufaktur. With signed label. Circa 1970. -
Grand vol bleu (great blue flight)
Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. N°EA1. 1973.A member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie), Wogensky is one of the many artists who would follow in Lurçat’s footsteps immediately after the war. At first influenced by his predecessor, Wogensky’s subsequent work (159 cartoons according to the 1989 exhibition catalogue) would evolve during the 1960’s towards a, not completely self-avowed, lyrical abstraction, from cosmic-astronomical themes expressed in decomposed, moving, birdlike shapes to cartoons both more refined and less dense. Although always claiming to be a painter, the artist’s conception of tapestry is extremely well thought out : “the realisation of a mural cartoon.... requires the consideration of a space which is no longer ours alone, by the nature of its dimensions, its scale, it also imposes a grand gesture which transforms and accentuates our presence.” Birds emerge as a theme in Wogensky’s work at the end of the 1960’s. In reality, if the titles of his works refer to them, their representation remains allusive, closer to images of flight frozen in time than to ornithological treatises : it is movement in space that is important, hence the titles ‘vol ...’[flight]. it is the movement in space that is important, hence the titles ‘flight ...’. At this time, Wogensky was interested in the material effects obtained by weavers through the use of different stitch sizes; The ‘grand vol bleu’, the high point of this thematic and formal orientation, is presented in majesty in the catalogue of the 1973 exhibition at La Demeure gallery. Bibliography : Cat. Expo. Robert Wogensky, 20 tapisseries récentes, galerie La Demeure, 1973, ill. n°1 (and a detail on front and back cover) Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, 1989, illustrated on front cover Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1989, ill. p.31 Gérard Denizeau, Denise Majorel, une vie pour la tapisserie, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, 1989, ill. p.70
