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  • Matin d'été (summer morning)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Laurent workshop. With signed label, n°2/6. 1983.
       
     
  • L'envolée (the flight)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. With label, n°EA1. Circa 1980.
     
     
  • Composition

       
    Tapestry woven by the artist. With signed label, and preparatory drawing. Circa 1980.
       
     
  • Tijuana

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Four workshop. With signed label, n°EA. Circa 1980.
       
     
  • Composition au chou (composition with cabbage)

     
    Tapestry woven By Lilette Keller. Circa 1963.
         
  • Eveil du jour (Awakening of the day)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With label, n°1/1. Circa 1980.
         
  • New York

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Goubely workshop. With signed label. 1960.
             
  • Belles des mers (sea beauties)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. 1953.
       
     
  • Composition aux oiseaux (composition with birds)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Laurent workshop. N°5/6. Circa 1980.
       
     
  • Les Champs-Elysées (the Champs Elysées)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop for the Compagnie des arts Français. 1945.
         
  • Idylle pastorale (pastoral idyll)

     
    Aubusson tapestry. Circa 1950.
         
  • Composition

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Caron workshop. Circa 1970.
         
  • Ciel de feu (fire sky)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With label, n°1/6. Circa 1970.
           
     
     
  • Ulysse et Nausicaa (Odysseus and Nausicaa)

       
    Tapestry woven by the Colombes workshop for "Ami de la Paix"(friend of peace). 1943.
     
     
     
  • Evolution

       
    Tapestry woven by Roland for "Ami de la Paix"(friend of peace). Circa 1945.
     
     
     
  • Le clown (the clown)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Hecquet workshop. With signed label, n°1/1. 1974.
     
     
     
  • Mexicaine aux arums (mexican with arum lilies)

      Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. With label, n°1/6. Circa 1990.
      Toffoli produced a large number of tapestries in collaboration with the Robert Four workshop from 1976 onwards, designing several hundred cartoons. In them we find post-cubist transparent effects which are characteristic of the artist, as indeed are the subjects treated. Thus Toffoli’s tapestries do not differ from his painting : travelling for inspiration, here he illustrates scenes observed during his travels in South America.    
  • Voile d'or (golden veil)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. With signed label, n°EA. Circa 1970.
        Fumeron designed his first cartoons (he would ultimately make over 500) in the 1940’s, in collaboration with the Pinton workshop, he was then commissioned on numerous occasions by the state before participating in the decoration of the ocean liner “France”. His work was figurative to begin with and influenced by Lurçat, then turned towards abstraction, before coming back to a style characterised by colourful figurative and realistic depictions from the 1980’s onwards.   An abstract cartoon, typical of the artist’s work, in a style (and a colour scheme !) which are redolent of Borderie or Wogensky, and which bear witness to the unceasing originality of his creativity.
     
     
  • Maternité aux fleurs (mother and child with flowers)

      Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. N°5/6. Circa 1990.
        Toffoli produced a large number of tapestries in collaboration with the Robert Four workshop from 1976 onwards, designing several hundred cartoons. In them we find post-cubist transparent effects which are characteristic of the artist, as indeed are the subjects treated. Thus Toffoli’s tapestries do not differ from his painting : travelling for inspiration, here he illustrates scenes observed during his exotic travels.  
  • La sylve (the forest)

     
     
    Tapestry woven by the Braquenié workshop. With label. 1968.
        Representing the prolific Belgian school of modern tapestry, Mary Dambiermont, is one of its most sensitive protagonists whose work is resolutely figurative. She made her tapestry début at the age of 24 in 1956 and that led her to a close collaboration with the Braquenié establishment in 1958 and from there to two participations in the Biennales de tapisserie in Lausanne in 1962 and 1965. The world she inhabits is a singular place peopled with hieratic figures, often feminine who inhabit dream-like landscapes which are strange and occasionally troubling. Sometimes however, nature is sufficient unto itself, although not often on the scale of this work (12 m2 !), abandoning any attempt at storytelling, as if an echo of bygone times in the history of Tapestry making : “With its twentieth century foliage, it reveals the ancient architecture of an immutable forest.” (Paul Caso, Mary Dambiermont, p.56)       Bibliography : Paul Caso, Mary Dambiermont, Editions Arts et voyages, 1975, ill p.54-55
  • Composition

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Henry workshop. With signed label, n°1/1. 1984.
       
       
  • Soleil d'août (august sun)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Braquenié workshop. With signed label. 1958.            
  • Lente approche (slow approach)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Braquenié workshop. With label. Circa 1960.
       
       
  • Les épées d'or (the golden swords)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Braquenié workshop. With label. Circa 1960.
       
       
  • Le soleil d'Apremont (the sun of Apremont)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. With signed label, n°1/4. Circa 1965.
     
    Maurice André settled in Aubusson for the duration of the second world war. A founding member of the group “Tapisserie de France” and a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie), he developed a personal style, different from that of Lurçat, characterised by rigorous, cubist-influenced flat areas of colour, often using a limited palette ; he received large-scale public commissions for the Council of Europe in Strasbourg (“L’Europe unie dans le Travail et la Paix”) or for the French pavilion at the Brussels Exhibition in 1958 (“La Technique moderne au service de l’Homme”). Gradually (as with Wogensky and Prassinos,...) his style evolved towards more abstraction, firstly lyrical and then more and more geometric, in a way very similar to Matégot.   In the mid 1960’s André’s style becomes comparable to that of Matégot, made of lyrical ensembles of triangular shapes, in a homogenous colour scheme and sprinkled with stripes, stains, marks... often black, where different techniques specific to the weaver’s art are used to accentuate the impression of volume and depth.
     
  • Plain-chant

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°1/4. 1974.
        Sautour-Gaillard had his first cartoon woven in 1971 by the Legoueix workshop (a collaboration which was to last), and from then on he designed many very large-scale projects of which the most spectacular was “Pour un certain idéal” a series of 17 tapestries dealing with the theme of Olympianism (property of the Musée de l’Olympisme in Lausanne). If at first close to lyrical abstraction, the artist produced in the 1990’s cartoons superimposing different decorative motifs, textures and figures whose unity originated in the woven texture itself.   The graphic characters which figure here suggest  calligraphy  and are characteristic of this artist’s tapestries from 1973 – 74, using these same colours. Here is how, in reference to Music, he defined his work at the time : “From my earliest efforts, I chose to make work which would not be a synthesis of images but rather construed as the orchestration of an architecture of colours ... The sensation of an imperceptible rustling as when the careful listening to a concert becomes tapestry.”     Bibliography : D. Cavelier, Jean-René Sautour-Gaillard, la déchirure, Lelivredart, 2013, ill. p.172-173    
  • Le verger (the orchard)

     
     
    Tapestry woven by the Braquenié workshop. With label. 1965.
        Representing the prolific Belgian school of modern tapestry, Mary Dambiermont, is one of its most sensitive protagonists whose work is resolutely figurative. She made her tapestry début at the age of 24 in 1956 and that led her to a close collaboration with the Braquenié establishment in 1958 and from there to two participations in the Biennales de tapisserie in Lausanne in 1962 and 1965. The world she inhabits is a singular place peopled with hieratic figures, often feminine who inhabit dream-like landscapes which are strange and occasionally troubling. This cartoon, shown at the biennale in Lausanne, is a development of the contemporary theme of enclosure (20 works exhibited in 1966), which is itself an echo of the mediaeval « hortus conclusus ».   Bibliography : Cat. Expo. 2e biennale internationale de la tapisserie, Lausanne, Musée cantonal des beaux-arts, 1965, ill. p.19 Paul Caso, Mary Dambiermont, Editions Arts et voyages, 1975, ill p.42-43  
  • Bouquet d'anniversaire (Birthday bouquet)

     
     
    Tapestry woven by the Braquenié workshop. 1969.
      Van Vlasselaer (1907-1982) is known for having created numerous monumental wall paintings as well as stain glass windows. From 1950 onwards he created tapestry cartoons inspired by scenes of everyday life, traditional Flemish folklore and natural subjects in keeping with the aesthetic of the group “Forces Murales”. He evolved from the figurative of his early work towards dense designs incorporating sharp-edged foliage laid out against geometrically inspired backgrounds influenced by Cubism.   “From 1969 onwards, his style became ever more flamboyant. One of the most remarkable examples is without doubt  “Bouquet d’anniversaire”...  on a monumental scale... Each detail is strikingly original. The foliage and the blossoms are rendered in such a way to take them beyond their natural condition in a fantastical style that still retains a certain rigour...” (R. Avermaete, van Vlasselaer Tapisseries, p.97)   Bibliography : R. Avermaete, van Vlasselaer Tapisseries, Editions Arcade, 1973, ill. p.88  
  • Flore des tropiques (tropical flora)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Four workshop. With label, n°EA. Circa 1975.
       
    Edmond Dubrunfaut can be considered as the great 20th century renovator of the Belgian tapestry tradition. He founded a weavers’ workshop in Tournai as early as 1942, then, in 1947, created the Centre de Rénovation de la Tapisserie de Tournai. He produced for various Belgian workshops (Chaudoir, de Wit,...) numerous cartoons destined notably to adorn Belgian embassies throughout the world. Moreover, Dubrunfaut was a teacher of monumental art forms at the Academie des Beaux-Arts de Mons from 1947 to 1978 and then, in 1979, contributed to the creation of the Fondation de la tapisserie, des arts du tissu et des arts muraux de Tournai, a veritable heritage centre for the art of the tapestry in Wallonie. His style, characterised by figuration, strong colour contrasts, draws direct inspiration from nature and animal life (as with Perrot, for example, this artist has a net predilection for birdlife).   Towards the end of his career, Dubrunfaut tended to a language of fantasy (whose sharpened forms are reminiscent of Marc Petit), and whose use of motif (humming birds and exotic vegetation) looks over its shoulder at Lurçat.
        Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Dubrunfaut et la renaissance de la tapisserie, tableaux, dessins, peintures, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Mons, 1982-1983
  • Composition

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Four workshop. N°6/6. Circa 1980.
       
     
  • Poissons et grives (fish and thrushes)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Ponthieu workshop. With signed label. Circa 1960.
             
  • Chantelune

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. With signed label, n°EA II. Circa 1970.
            Henri Ilhe, who came to the design of tapestry cartoons late on in his career, still managed to produce from 1964 onwards a considerable number (more than 120, all woven by the Tabard workshop) in an urbane style, incorporating birds and butterflies sporting in and around the gnarled branches of trees and bushes.   “Chantelune” is thus, characteristic of Ilhe’s bucolic inspiration.
     
  • Le rouge et le noir (the red and the black)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Braquenié workshop. With label. Circa 1960.
            Lucas was a protagonist of tapestry renewal in Belgium following on from the “Forces murales” collective. He gave a certain number of cartoons to the Braquenié workshop in Malines in the years 1956 – 1957, designed in a style somewhat reminiscent of Picart le Doux.  
     
  • Kalinka

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Andraud workshop. With label, n°4/6. 1980.
           
    Established in the Creuse region of France, he started working on tapestries in 1965 with the Andraud workshop for whom he designed cartoons inspired by the local flora, in a decorative style which can be situated somewhere between that of Dom Robert and Maingonnat, a world away from his landscape paintings which were strongly influenced by the impressionists.   The title of this piece, which will be evocative to lovers of folk-song, is the name (but in Russian !) of the subject illustrated : kalinka meaning guelder-rose.
  • Nuit sidérale (astral night)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With label. Circa 1965.
     
     
    Maurice André settled in Aubusson for the duration of the second world war. A founding member of the group “Tapisserie de France” and a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie), he developed a personal style, different from that of Lurçat, characterised by rigorous, cubist-influenced flat areas of colour, often using a limited palette ; he received large-scale public commissions for the Council of Europe in Strasbourg (“L’Europe unie dans le Travail et la Paix”) or for the French pavilion at the Brussels Exhibition in 1958 (“La Technique moderne au service de l’Homme”). Gradually (as with Wogensky and Prassinos,...) his style evolved towards more abstraction, firstly lyrical and then more and more geometric, in a way very similar to Matégot.   In the mid 1960’s André’s style becomes comparable to that of Matégot, where battage, pick and pick and shading are the norm. By its theme, its technique, its colour scheme, its format, this particular cartoon is close to « Grand nocturne » copies of which are to be found at the Musée Jean Lurçat and the musée de la tapisserie contemporaine in Angers.
  • Bouquet d'automne (autumn bouquet)

     
    Aubusson tapestry. N°EA1. Circa 1975.  
        A student at the ENAD, Goffinet was a close collaborator of Dirk Holger whose influence (as also that of Prassinos) is notable in the rare tapestries woven from cartoons of his design. On occasion, as in this case, he wove his designs himself.  
  • Arès et Aphrodite (Ares and Aphrodite)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. With signed label, n°1/4. Circa 1970.
        « It is thus easy to understand that, having based my painting on my love of tapestry, it was relatively easy for me, and particularly tempting, to produce tapestries which were faithful to my painting” writes the artist in the exhibition catalogue for the 1970 show at the Galerie Verrière.It is not until 1961 that he started making designs (over 50) both for woven tapestries (at Aubusson, but also for the Mobilier National with, on occasion, the collaboration of Pierre Baudoin), but also those employing needlepoint. The artist’s very audacious palette is immediately recognisable in these cartons, with their use of primary colours. But if Lapicque’s artistic language is established in the 1950’s, the themes which appear in his work evolve with time : thus mythological subjects (recurrent in the history of tapestry making) appear in his work following a journey to Greece in 1964, and « Diane et Actéon », then « Pélops » were the first of his cartoons to be woven in Aubusson predating “Arès et Aphrodite” whose depiction is faithful to the ancient texts (Homer, Ovid) : Hephaestus throwing his net and the Olympian gods laughing at the scene....     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue, Expo Lapicque, Lyons, Galerie Verrière 1970
  • La girafe en feu (Flaming giraffe)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. With signed label, n°3/6. 1985.
     
      Despite Dali’s immense aura, his works have never been woven in the National Manufactures and, although the mechanically woven versions of his paintings are indeed (too?) numerous, the handwoven Aubusson tapestries of his works are extremely rare : only the Picaud and Jean Laurent workshops were privileged enough to produce them. It was Pierre Argillet who was their instigator. A close associate of the surrealists and particularly Dali, he put together a wonderful collection which he installed in the château at Vaux-le-Pénil in the department of Seine et Marne, where he opened his museum of Surrealism at the same period that Dali inaugurated his museum in Figueras (Teatro-museu Dali) : they agreed at the time to commission tapestries of earlier works of the artist to decorate the galeries of both locations.   Hence « la girafe en feu » is the transposition of one of the 7 engravings of the series entitled « Tauromachie surréaliste » produced by Argillet in 1966 and was intended as a bridge connecting Picasso’s “ tauromaquia” and Dali’s surrealist inspiration (the flaming giraffe had been a recurrent trope since the 1930’s). From a technical point of view, the transfer from one medium to the other is visible proof of the highly skilled artistry of which the weavers had become masters since the tapestry renaissance of the 20th century.
  • Au crépuscule (at dusk)

     
    Tapestry woven in the DMW workshop. With signed label. 1974.  
      Edmond Dubrunfaut can be considered as the great 20th century renovator of the Belgian tapestry tradition. He founded a weavers’ workshop in Tournai as early as 1942, then, in 1947, created the Centre de Rénovation de la Tapisserie de Tournai. He produced for various Belgian workshops (Chaudoir, de Wit,…) numerous cartoons destined notably to adorn Belgian embassies throughout the world. Moreover, Dubrunfaut was a teacher of monumental art forms at the Academie des Beaux-Arts de Mons from 1947 to 1978 and then, in 1979, contributed to the creation of the Fondation de la tapisserie, des arts du tissu et des arts muraux de Tournai, a veritable heritage centre for the art of the tapestry in Wallonie. His style, characterised by figuration, strong colour contrasts, draws direct inspiration from nature and animal life (as with Perrot, for example, this artist has a net predilection for birdlife).   In this respect, this cartoon is characteristic of the aforementioned predilection, but here the realistic representation of the motif is a departure from Perrot’s habitual stylisation.       Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Dubrunfaut et la renaissance de la tapisserie, tableaux, dessins, peintures, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Mons, 1982-1983, n°254.
  • Sonnen-Vision (Suns-Vision)

        Tapestry woven by the Münchener Gobelin Manufaktur. With signed label. 1975.      
    Holger was a student at the Ecole Nationale d’Art Décoratif d’Aubusson and worked with Lurçat before the latter’s death in 1966. He designed numerous dream-like cartoons woven by the Aubusson workshop. Now settled in the United States, he remains a tireless advocate for, and witness to, modern tapestry design, organising exhibitions and lectures on the subject.   Some of his cartoons have been woven in the two workshops active in Germany, in Nuremberg and Munich, using Aubusson techniques.
  • Poisson cardinal (cardinal fish)

       
    Tapestry woven in the Saint-Cyr workshop. With signed label, n°EA2. 1978.
     
     
    Roger Bezombes was a proponent of monumental art from the beginning. He received numerous commissions for tapestries on behalf of the state which were woven first at the Gobelins and then at Aubusson, particularly with the Hamot workshop whose dyers were able to produce for him wools to match exactly the colours used for his cartons (which he painted himself to scale). In 1952-53, he produced a monumental set (300 m2) for the pavilion of the French colonies at the Cité Universitaire de Paris. He abandoned the weaving technique at the end of the 1950’s in favour of hangings made of assembled fabrics.   These murals (one of the first of which « la Musique », 25m long, was commissioned for France’s broadcasting headquarters La Maison de la Radio) are patchworks made from assembled fragments of cloth, and sometimes other  materials, sewn, stuck or stapled together. However, as here, some of his murals were reproduced in tapestry form by the Saint Cyr workshop belonging to Pierre Daquin. In these cases the theme of the fish is omnipresent ; Bezombes however is no ichthyologist, rather a poet : it is the colour, cardinal red, which concerns him here and not the fish of the same name.
  • Table noire (black table)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. With signed label. 1953.
        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 Gobelins, 2016technical 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.   The theme of the laid table is a leitmotiv in Lurçat’s work as early as the 1940’s (cf The four corners, 1943 Goubely-Gatien workshop, Angers Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine). These tables, often with connotations of the horn of plenty and often featuring musical instruments (most often the mandolin) recall the traditional still life’s of the XVIIth century, not, as it happens, a theme of contemporary tapestry.           Bibliography : Tapisseries de Jean Lurçat 1939-1957, Pierre Vorms Editeur, 1957, ill. n°105 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, Nice, Musée des Ponchettes, 1968 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, Denise Majorel, une vie pour la tapisserie, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016    
  • Au coeur de l'ombre (At the heart of darkness)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°1/3 (and handwritten note "tirage arrêté 1/2" [stopped edition 1/2]). 1971.
          After the traditional completion of some mural paintings in the 1930’s, he then arrived in Aubusson in 1936, became closely associated with Picart le Doux in 1947 and then joined the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie). From then on he devoted himself to tapestry with zeal and designed 167 cartoons, at first figurative following on from Picart le Doux and Saint-Saëns, then, influenced by the scientific themes that he dealt with, tending more towards abstraction. In 1981, two years before his death, he donated his studio to the Musée départemental de la tapisserie in Aubusson. This cartoon (the only one dating from 1971) is a prelude to 1972, the year of the « ombres » “shadows” : every 13th cartoon he designs that year has the word in its title; a possible reference to the contemporaneous design of stained glass windows for the temple (protestant church) in Villefavard.   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Hommage à Louis-Marie Jullien, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1983, n°148 (the model is illustrated)  
     
  • Soleil couchant (Sunset)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. n°2/6. Circa 1970.
        Fumeron designed his first cartoons (he would ultimately make over 500) in the 1940’s, in collaboration with the Pinton workshop, he was then commissioned on numerous occasions by the state before participating in the decoration of the ocean liner “France”. His work was figurative to begin with and influenced by Lurçat, then turned towards abstraction, before coming back to a style characterised by colourful figurative and realistic depictions from the 1980’s onwards.   A recurrent design motif in Fumeron’s work, the setting sun (orange or red) here appears through a screen of trees in a cartoon which verges on abstraction.  
     
     
  • Germination

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Henry workshop. With signed label, n°2/6. Circa 1980.         Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   The association of two elements is extremely common in the work of Picart le Doux : it allows for the complementary presentation of two elements day/night , sea/sky, land/sea…. In the association presented here we see Nature as one and unified, the sun warms the plant and thus produces « Germination »     Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Joufray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980        
  • Jonques (junks)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Jean Laurent workshop. N°3/6. Circa 1990.
        In a similar vein to Toffoli, Raymond Poulet criss-crossed the world and his travels provided the themes that inspired his work.
     
  • Trois variations sur un thème géométrique simple (three variations on a simple geometric theme)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. With label, n°1/6. Circa 1970.
          A multi-talented artist, at one and the same time, painter, writer, critic, theorist and art historian, Seuphor moved among the Parisian avant-garde of the 1920’s : he founded the group ‘Cercle et Carré” which took as its philosophy the principles of the neo-plasticism of Mondrian – with whom he was closely associated – and he was always at the forefront of the movement for abstract geometrical art. In the 1950’s he developed his “dessins à lacunes à traits horizontaux” or “drawings with spaced horizontal lines” for which he is principally known as an artist. It is from these works that his tapestries developed, woven in the Manufactures Nationales at the end of the 1960’s.   “Three variations....” can equally be seen in this light where black horizontal lines of varying density contrast with plain areas, creating a tension between filled and empty space, alternating colours which can be said to be the essence of neo-plasticism.  
  • Damier blanc (white draughtboard)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With label. Circa 1955.
            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 Gobelins, 2016technical 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.   Draughtboards, cabinets, display cases are all methods of dividing up the woven space which are typical of Lurçat's work. However, as is often the case, here the title leaves us a long way from the subject : the evocation of the exotic natural world.       Bibliography : Tapisseries de Jean Lurçat 1939-1957, Pierre Vorms Editeur, 1957 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, Nice, Musée des Ponchettes, 1968 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, Denise Majorel, une vie pour la tapisserie, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016  
  • Aubusson

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Andraud-Dethève workshop. 1943.
     
     
    Maurice André settled in Aubusson for the duration of the second world war. A founding member of the group “Tapisserie de France” and a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie), he developed a personal style, different from that of Lurçat, characterised by rigorous, cubist-influenced flat areas of colour, often using a limited palette ; he received large-scale public commissions for the Council of Europe in Strasbourg (“L’Europe unie dans le Travail et la Paix”) or for the French pavilion at the Brussels Exhibition in 1958 (“La Technique moderne au service de l’Homme”). Gradually (as with Wogensky and Prassinos,...) his style evolved towards more abstraction, firstly lyrical and then more and more geometric, in a way very similar to Matégot.   « Aubusson », Maurice André’s first tapestry cartoon, illustrates both how he adheres to Lurçat’s principles of technique (counted threads, large flat areas of colour...) and how his aesthetic can be seen to be different (as it is from Gromaire’s own treatment of the same subject some years earlier). His closest influence at the time is in fact Dubrueil, his father-in-law, his own stylistic emancipation would come a little later. The historical importance of the cartoon is undeniable : it is one of the rare illustrations of the town  (even more synthesised than Gromaire’s version) at a time when the Tapestry Renaissance was in its infancy.
  • Florale n°3  (Floral n°3)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With label signed by the artist's widow. Circa 1955.
          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 Gobelins, 2016technical 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.   The framing of motifs is a recurrent trope in Lurçat's production (one only has to think of his “armoires” - cabinets) ; nevertheless, nature, flowers, cannot be contained and tend to spill over, out of the frame. This composition partially revisits (the right-hand side) his work entitled “Nouveau jardin Marcenac”, a cartoon dating from 1955.           Bibliography : Tapisseries de Jean Lurçat 1939-1957, Pierre Vorms Editeur, 1957 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, Nice, Musée des Ponchettes, 1968 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, Denise Majorel, une vie pour la tapisserie, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016  
  • Composition

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. N°EA2. Circa 1980.
       
    An artistic all-rounder, who defined himself as “neither a painter, nor a draughtsman, nor a poster artist, nor a writer, nor an engraver. My work is neither abstract nor figurative ... I do not pretend to understand my images, and everyone is free to understand them as they like. I have merely tried to represent my own imaginings, in the hope that others will be able to recognise their own in them”, Folon was an incredibly successful artist, from his illustrations for famous American magazines in the 1960’s, his many poster designs, the works he presented at the Biennials in Venice and in Sao Paolo to the television credits for Antenne 2,... There is therefore no reason to be surprised that he also turned his hand to tapestry design (his largest piece, 80m2 is exhibited at the Centre des Congrès in Monaco, woven, as all his other works in the genre, by the Four workshop), in his characteristic airy and understated style whose inspiration is not a thousand miles from that of his compatriot Magritte.   The aesthetic employed in our tapestry is directly descended from watercolour (pale colours that melt into one another), his preferred medium (there is also a lithograph), which makes his work specific and a world away from that of  other painter-cartoonists of the same period. The representation of the sun as an eye,a leitmotiv in Folon’s work, overlooking a landscape, bears witness to the particular dream-like character of the universe his art inhabits.
           
  • Les jonques (junks)

      Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. With  signed label, n°1/6. Circa 1980.
          Toffoli produced a large number of tapestries in collaboration with the Robert Four workshop from 1976 onwards, designing several hundred cartoons. In them we find post-cubist transparent effects which are characteristic of the artist, as indeed are the subjects treated. Thus Toffoli’s tapestries do not differ from his painting : travelling for inspiration, here he illustrates  junks observed during trips to the far East.
  • Les hyades

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°5/6. 1968.
     
     
      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.”   « Les Hyades » is a work inspired by Wogensky’s « cosmic » vein (it’s title alone bears witness to the fact) which lasted through the 1960’s and of which “Cosmos” (1968 Strasbourg University) and “Galaxy” (1970, Sénat Palais du Luxembourg) would be the high points. Shading (omnipresent) and blocks of colour co-exist in a subtle harmony, evoking a curious, unknown world with elements of the infinitely small as seen through a microscope and the infinitely large.   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, 1989 Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1989-1990    
  • Coqthon (Cocktuna)

       
    Tapestry probably woven in Aubusson, in the Goubely workshop. Circa 1950.
          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 Gobelins, 2016technical 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.   If there is one motif that is omnipresent in Lurçat’s work over the years it is that of the cockerel, in an infinite variety of interpretations. It can be used in many and various associations, syntheses (cocktuna rather than cock and tuna) bridging different elements, hierarchies, natural worlds.       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, Denise Majorel, une vie pour la tapisserie, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016    
  • Fleur passée (faded flower)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Goubely workshop. With label, n°5/6. 1974.
        Michel Tourlière, through both his production and his official responsibilities, was one of the leading lights of the renewal of the art of tapestry in the XXth century. Trained at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs, Toulière met Lurçat as early as 1945, designed his first cartoon « le vigneron » (the winegrower) in 1946 (in the same year he moved to Aubusson), became a founder member of the APCT (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) in 1947. After this explosive start to his career, he became a teacher at the Ecole Nationale des Arts Décoratifs in Aubusson, then its director in 1960 before becoming the director of the Paris school in 1970, while at the same time creating the ministerial delegation of artistic creativity at the Ministry of Culture. Despite his heavy official responsibilities (which paved his way to numerous public commissions), Tourlière designed many cartoons (around 300) in a lyrical abstract style, a personal transcription from nature, comprising simplified, ridged (irregular weaving technique) shapes (scrolls, circles…) in warm colours redolent of autumn (orange, red, brown) which give an undulating relief effect.   The flower theme-motif, originating in 1960 (« Fleur de nuit »), became ever more ubiquitous in the 1970’s (« Fleur ouverte », « Fleur de vent », « Fleur de vigne blanche »,…) with varying formats and colour schemes. Perhaps the title was suggested by an amusing reversal of the botanical term « passer fleur ».* Winemaking was a constant source of inspiration for  this artist of Burgundian origin. *When the vine has successfully weathered the flowering season and the fruit is formed [Translator's note].   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue rétrospective 1945-1985, Paris Arts Center, 1986, ill p.85 Exhibition Catalogue Tourlière, Tapisseries, dessins 1945-1992, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, Aubusson, Musée Départemental de la Tapisserie, 1992-1993 Exhibition catalogue Michel Tourlière rétrospective, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Beaune, 2017      
  • Composition

      Tapestry, probably Aubusson woven. Circa 1970   If Lanskoy’s work starts to evolve towards the abstract from the beginning of the 1940’s, his first cartoons date from the 1950’s : thus they are all abstract. Originally working with Picaud’s workshop at Aubusson, he would go on to collaborate with Maurice Chassagne (on whose productions there never appears any indication of the workshop nor certificate of authenticity), but his work was also woven by the Manufactures Nationales, and “Consolation” would be hung in the ocean liner “France”, undeniable proof of official recognition for this artist. A major protagonist of lyrical abstraction whose work was championed by the major art galleries of the period (Jeanne Bucher, Louis Carré), Lanskoy whose luxuriant painting style employed a festival of colours (pinks, mauves and oranges are frequent) avoided his characterestic layering of paint when he produced work for weaving. In the same more contained more vein, the forms employed tend to be less exuberant.    
  • Le luth et le chandelier (the lute and the candelabra)



    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Hamot workshop.
    With signed label, n°2/8.
    Circa 1955.




    Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...



    In this cartoon (strangely absent from Bruzeau’s book), the accent is squarely placed by the title on the chandelier itself, but there are familiar aspects of the artist’s habitual repertoire, reflecting a past, ideal golden age, with the viola da gamba and the butterflies. The inclusion of these motifs and the red background are both reminiscent of the 1955 tapestry Damier (checkerboard) (Bruzeau n° 68)



    Bibliography :
    Marthe Belle-Joufray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966
    Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972
    Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976
    Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980






  • Gestation

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. With label, n°2/6. Circa 1980.
     
      Known essentially as a sculptor, Segeron produced a certain number of cartoons, woven by Legoueix in Aubusson. In a variety of colours and under a number of different titles, we are confronted by a scattering, almost as though torn, of similar shape-designs rather like strange rhizomes or capillary networks.
  • La plage (the beach)

      Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop, for the Compagnie des Arts Français. 1942.     Adnet, who was placed at the head of the Compagnie des Arts Français in 1928, was keen to reinstate tapestry design as an art, distinct from painting, and a key element in interior decoration, with the constraint of numbered coloured threads (in a very similar approach to that of Lurçat). With this intention he contacted at the same time Desnoyer, Coutaud, Planson, and Brianchon. Known above all as a studio artist Desnoyer whose classicism is tempered by an intense use of colour, is an important painter of the French school between the wars. His work was woven by the Gobelins in the 1950’s.   This cartoon displays the simplified forms and saturated colours which are characteristic of Desnoyer’s paintings. As for the theme, it is a recurrent one in his work (Desnoyer lived in Sète before moving to Saint-Cyprien), even though, retrospectively, it might appear somewhat at odds with daily life under the Occupation.     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue La tapisserie française du moyen âge à nos jours, Musée d’Art Moderne, Paris, 1946, n°246 Cat. Exp. Le Mobilier National et les Manufactures Nationales des Gobelins et de Beauvais sous la IVe République, Beauvais, Galerie de la Tapisserie, 1997  
  • La grâce (grace)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. With signed label, n°5/6. Circa 1990.
     
        Kozo Inoué moved to Paris in 1960 and devoted himself mainly to screen printing. His work was woven by the Four workshop from 1984 onwards. In his works, all of which present “grace” unfolding petals, leaves or butterflies, as if suspended,  single (or occasionally multiple) motifs against a contrasting, shaded background.
  • Californie  (California)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Bascoulergue workshop. With signed label, n°1/8. Circa 1970.
          First a poster artist, then an artist-ethnographer during the war, Perrot began his career as a cartoon designer at its end, making almost 500 cartoons, most of which were woven at Aubusson, including numerous commissions from the state (with 33 cartoons, Perrot is the most prolific tapestry designer in the Mobilier National’s collection!). His style which is particularly rich and decorative is eminently recognisable : he illustrates in flat colours (with neither shading nor picking) an abundance of animals (most often birds), standing out with no perspective, against a background of vegetation, in a style reminiscent of the mediaeval mille-fleurs tapestries.   A cartoon whose design is typical of Perrot but which however contains a nod to exoticism in its choice of vegetation.     Bibliography : Tapisseries, dessins, peintures, gravures de René Perrot, Dessein et Tolra, 1982 Exhibition catalogue René Perrot, mon pauvre cœur est un hibou, Aubusson, Cité Internationale de la Tapisserie, 2023    
  • Fleurs éclatées (shattered flowers)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. With label, n°1/6. Circa 1980.
     
        Known essentially as a sculptor, Segeron produced a certain number of cartoons, woven by Legoueix in Aubusson. In a variety of colours and under a number of different titles, we are confronted by a scattering, almost as though torn, of similar shape-designs rather like strange rhizomes or capillary networks.
  • Sérénade

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. Circa 1950.     With a taste for the large-scale, influenced by Untersteller at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, Hilaire undertook numerous mural paintings. In the same vein, beginning in 1949, along with a number of other artists stimulated by Lurçat, (he would join the latter at the A.P.C.T. Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) he designed a number of cartoons some of which were woven at Beauvais or at Les Gobelins.   This tapestry is probably one of Hilaire’s first cartoons for the medium, at a period in his work when the human figure was still omnipresent (before disappearing completely around 1960), and he was being regularly commissioned for works in public spaces : this bucolic « Serenade » can be seen to refer to « Quatuor » a cartoon dating from 1950 and woven by Pinton for the Mobilier National.     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Hilaire, œuvre tissé, galerie Verrière, 1970 Exhibition catalogue, du trait à la lumière, Musée Départemental Georges de la Tour at Vic-sur-Seille, 2010.    
  • Bouquet d'artifice  (Bouquet of "flowerworks")

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. Avec son bolduc signé de l'artiste. Circa 1960.
            First a poster artist, then an artist-ethnographer during the war, Perrot began his career as a cartoon designer at its end, making almost 500 cartoons, most of which were woven at Aubusson, including numerous commissions from the state (with 33 cartoons, Perrot is the most prolific tapestry designer in the Mobilier National’s collection!). His style which is particularly rich and decorative is eminently recognisable : he illustrates in flat colours (with neither shading nor picking) an abundance of animals (most often birds), standing out with no perspective, against a background of vegetation, in a style reminiscent of the mediaeval mille-fleurs tapestries.   Rather like a floral display of pyrotechnics, « Bouquet d’artifice » (Bouquet of “flowerworks”) presents an abundant spray of numerous varieties, some even slightly stylised, in a riot of colours accentuated by the black background : an ode to Nature.     Bibliography : Tapisseries, dessins, peintures, gravures de René Perrot, Dessein et Tolra, 1982 Exhibition catalogue René Perrot, mon pauvre cœur est un hibou, Aubusson, Cité Internationale de la Tapisserie, 2023  
  • A chacun son soleil à chacun sa lumière (To each his sun to each his light)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Tabard workshop. With label. Circa 1960.
        Essentially known to the artistic community for her ink drawings and illustrations, Filozof is proof of the variety of artists whose work has been woven in Aubusson over the years.  Although the naïf style (or one which is at least influenced by folk art) is hardly over-represented (but we can mention here Mady de la Giraudière) : 8 of her designs have been woven by Tabard.
  • Oiseau (bird)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. N°2/6. Circa 1980.
        The figurative artist, Gilles Coudour, made several cartoons available to the Legoueix workshop ; in this medium his smooth style of acrylic painting has given way to interesting textured effects to suggest feathers and tree trunks.
  • Les gaîtés du soir (evening gaieties)

     
    Aubusson tapestry, woven in the Tabard workshop. With signed label, n°1. Circa 1968.
    Better known for his geometrically inspired paintings incorporating on occasion mechanical elements, Gachon designed several tapestry cartoons even from the early days of his career as his contacts with the Tabard workshop from the late 1960’s reveal.   This design shows the influence on the young man of lyrical abstraction, an artistic current which finds little expression generally in tapestry.
  • Les mauvaises herbes (Weeds)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. With signed label, n°6/8. Circa 1980.
        A rare incursion into tapestry design by one better-known as a lover of books, an occasional illustrator, and a wine-grower.
  • Composition

     
    Tapestry, probably woven in Aubusson. Circa 1970.
    Better known for his geometrically inspired paintings incorporating on occasion mechanical elements, Gachon who came originally from Aubusson, did however design a certain number of tapestry cartoons.   In this work one sees the artist evolving towards a design of more structured and organised forms, a prelude to his later development.
  • Treilles (trellis)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop for Leleu. With label. 1964.
     
    With a taste for the large-scale, influenced by Untersteller at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, Hilaire undertook numerous mural paintings. In the same vein, beginning in 1949, along with a number of other artists stimulated by Lurçat, (he would join the latter at the A.P.C.T. Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) he designed a number of cartoons some of which were woven at Beauvais or at Les Gobelins.   This tapestry hung in the dining-room of the villa Médy Roc, at the Cap d’Antibes, for which the Leleu studio designed furnishings and fittings starting in 1957 : their philosophy, inspired by Jacques Adnet’s theories of the interweaving of architecture, furniture and tapestry design , which should all be unified by a single view, was to lean into the idea of a tradition of good taste “à la française”, as interpreted by the best designers and artists of the period. With this in mind, another work, also by Hilaire, “Jardin à la française” was already in place in the dining-room before this tapestry, where a traditional trellis shelters birds of more exotic plumage, was installed in the same area in 1964. Both works appear in the film “Les seins de glace”, directed by Lautner featuring Delon, Brasseur and Mireille Darc, which was filmed on location in the villa.     Provenance : villa Médy Roc, Cap d’Antibes   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Hilaire, œuvre tissé, galerie Verrière, 1970 Exhibition catalogue, du trait à la lumière, Musée Départemental Georges de la Tour at Vic-sur-Seille, 2010.
  • Coqubu

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. With signed label. Circa 1960.
             
  • Fleurs et feuilles (flowers and leaves)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Braquenié workshop. With label. Circa 1960.
       
    Multi-talented artist (poet, lyricist, painter and even antiques dealer,…) Saint-Martin, who assisted Lurçat at the beginning of the 1950’s, started designing his own cartoons in 1956 and they were woven in the Braquenié workshop. His is a dream-like, stylised and dramatised world : here, symbols of order and discipline (the still life composition, the wrought iron balustrade...) contrast with the unsettling, unfettered profusion of the branches on each side.  
  • Composition

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. N°2/6. Circa 1980.
       
    An artistic all-rounder, who defined himself as “neither a painter, nor a draughtsman, nor a poster artist, nor a writer, nor an engraver. My work is neither abstract nor figurative ... I do not pretend to understand my images, and everyone is free to understand them as they like. I have merely tried to represent my own imaginings, in the hope that others will be able to recognise their own in them”, Folon was an incredibly successful artist, from his illustrations for famous American magazines in the 1960’s, his many poster designs, the works he presented at the Biennials in Venice and in Sao Paolo to the television credits for Antenne 2,... There is therefore no reason to be surprised that he also turned his hand to tapestry design (his largest piece, 80m2 is exhibited at the Centre des Congrès in Monaco, woven, as all his other works in the genre, by the Four workshop), in his characteristic airy and understated style whose inspiration is not a thousand miles from that of his compatriot Magritte. The aesthetic employed in our tapestry is directly descended from watercolour (pale colours that melt into one another), his preferred medium (there is also a lithograph), which makes his work specific and a world away from that of  other painter-cartoonists of the same period.
       
  • Les six cyprès (the six cypresses)

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Goubely workshop. With signed  label. 1957.   I became interested in the art of tapestry particularly because I was excited by the numbered cartoon technique consisting of the fabrication of a mental coloured image using a code…. Tapestry is an essential exercise. As I practised it, it is perhaps the desire to interrogate, down to the finest detail, a work which exists in two dimensions.” (quoted in the exhibition  catalogue, Prassinos, rétrospective de l’oeuvre peint et dessiné, Puyricard, 1983). So much for the artist’s manifesto.  Prassinos designed his first cartoons in 1951 (most of which, around 150, would be woven in the Goubely workshop); then he joined the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie). After several cartoons taking birds as their theme, Prassinos, like several other artists, despite being close to Lurçat, (Matégot, Wogensky…) turned resolutely towards abstraction, in a very personal style where sinuous shapes entwine in contrasting colours (often following a scheme of black-red-brown-beige).   Prassinos moved to Eygalières in 1951 and his first tapestries were designed at the same period : « Cyprès noir » and « Cyprès rouge », both from 1952, number among his very first cartoons, echoing the simultaneous discovery of a locality and a technique. Here the subject is revisited on a larger scale ; one of the 3 originals is in the possession of the Musée Municipal d’Arnhem.       Bibliography : Exhibition Catalogue Mario Prassinos, œuvre tissé, Galerie la Demeure, 1961, ill. p.20-21 Exhibition catalogue Mario Prassinos, tapisseries monumentales, Abbaye de Montmajour, Arles, 1974 Mario Prassinos, œuvre tissé, La Demeure, 1974, n°20 Exhibition catalogue Mario Prassinos, Tapisseries , Aubusson, Musée départemental de le Tapisserie, 1984 Exhibition catalogue Prassinos, Tapisseries, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1988
  • Helios

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. With signed label. Circa 1960.
        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 Gobelins, 2016technical 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.     His use of the « cloisonné » motif is frequent, be it on checkerboards, coats of arms ; here he uses a spiral of sections assembled in a helix  (cf also “Haut zodiac” for example), whose circular shape with rays spinning outwards evokes the sun : and the title leaves no room for doubt.         Bibliography : Tapisseries de Jean Lurçat 1939-1957, Pierre Vorms Editeur, 1957 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, Nice, Musée des Ponchettes, 1968, ill. 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, Denise Majorel, une vie pour la tapisserie, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016    
  • Aubusson

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Goubely workshop. 1940.
       
    Gromaire’s woven pieces are few in number : 11 cartoons, designed between 1938 and 1944, most of them in Aubusson. “His rigorous construction, his use of simplification, his penchant for grand composition and grand fundamental ideas, his knowledgeable use of colour and in sum his supreme quality as a master-craftsman, all of those things were to make of him one of the most expert tapestry artists of his time”, so wrote Jean Cassou (Exhibition catalogue, Marcel Gromaire, Paris, Musée Nationale d’art moderne, 1963). It was Guillaume Janneau, then in the chair of the Mobilier National, who contacted him in 1938, convinced that his style (simplification of shape, geometrical designs framed in black, influenced by cubism, limited colour schemes…) would have something to contribute to the resolution of the new aesthetic problems that the art of tapestry would have to confront in order to bring about its renewal (simplified palette, synthetic cartoon design...) firstly with a commission for a work on the theme of the four elements, then with a second (“les saisons”, the seasons) which would be produced at Aubusson. In 1940 Gromaire joined Lurçat and Dubreuil there. Working alone, with great  meticulosity (numerous drawings anticipate the cartoon which is painted rather than numbered as with Lurçat), in close collaboration with Suzanne Goubely, who would weave all his cartoons, he spent 4 years in Aubusson, during which time he devoted all his creative energy to tapestry. At the end of the war, he left the Creuse and produced no more cartoons, leaving to Lurçat the position of grand initiator of the tapestry renewal movement. « Aubusson » is one of the 5 tapestry cartoons that Gromaire designed for the Goubely workshop during the War, and it is emblematic of his « stained glass window » style, busy and geometric. And even if one recognises some of the emblematic features of Aubusson (the clock tower, the church of Sainte Croix...), which Gromaire was coming to know at the time, the town appears to be squeezed in by the rugged natural features that surround it (to which the artist was particularly attracted as can be seen from the many drawings made at this time) steep cliffs and rushing rivers and streams.
       
    Interestingly, a copy of this cartoon, woven later in 1960, was displayed in the ocean liner “France”, the only tapestry whose conception predated the commission for the decorative hangings ; what better symbol could there be as a medium (tapestry) and a subject (France’s own landscape) both vectors of tradition, to portray the modernity of French style (Bruno Foucart), and the liner “France” herself.     Bibliography : Le Point, Aubusson et la renaissance de la Tapisserie, mars 1946, ill. Formes et couleurs, n°5-6, 1942, ill. L’amour de l’art, la tapisserie Française, 1946, ill. p.185 Jean Lurçat, Tapisserie française, Bordas, 1947 J. Cassou, M. Damain, R. Moutard-Uldry, la tapisserie française et les peintres cartonniers, Tel, 1957 Symposium Jean Lurçat et la renaissance de la tapisserie in Aubusson, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie 1992 Exhibition catalogue Jean Lurçat, compagnons de route et passants considérables, Eglise de Felletin, 1992, ill. p. 25 (and detail on front cover) Exhibition catalogue, Gromaire, œuvre tissée, Aubusson, Musée de la tapisserie, 1995, ill. p. 53 (and on front cover) Exhibition catalogue La manufacture des Gobelins dans la première moitié du XXe siècle, Beauvais, Galerie nationale de la tapisserie, 1999 Armelle Bouchet Mazas, le paquebot France, Paris, 2006, ill. p.67 Aubusson, Cité internationale de la tapisserie, guide du visiteur, 2016, ill.p.57
  • Vent de sable (sandstorm)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°EA/2. Circa 1970.
      Originally a sculptor exploiting very diverse materials (steel, concrete, clay…), Borderie came to tapestry with immense enthusiasm in the 1950’s with the weaving of his first cartoon in 1957. Receiving encouragement from Denise Majorel, he was awarded the Grand Prix National de la Tapisserie in 1962. In 1974 he was appointed as director at the Ecole Nationale des Arts Décoratifs at Aubusson but he resigned from this post shortly thereafter. He designed over 500 painted cartoons, abstracts using simple shapes, shading in a limited palette of colours and weaving with gros points.   A dynamic abstraction with a limited colour scheme running from orange to brown, abstract motifs which play on the plastic effect of light passing through the colours : a classic cartoon from André Borderie.   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue André Borderie « pour l’homme simplement », Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1998 J.J. et B. Wattel, André Borderie et la tapisserie d'Aubusson, Editions Louvre Victoire, 2018
  • Eclosion (hatching)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°1/6. Circa 1970.           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,…) from whence he came.   Here is a thoroughly characteristic cartoon of this artist who specialises in pastures, hedges and woodland scenes.
  • Le grand tétras (Capercaillie)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°2/6. Circa 1970.           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,…) from whence he came.   Here is a thoroughly characteristic cartoon of this artist who specialises in pastures, hedges and woodland scenes.
  • Cadmée

      Aubusson tapestry woven by the Picaud workshop. With signed label, n°1/4. 1970.
       
    Loewer designed his first cartoon in 1953 ; his early works are first figurative before turning to abstraction (like Matégot) which is exclusively geometric in Loewer’s case. He designed over 180 cartoons, most of which were woven by his friend, Raymond Picaud.   Only one example of this tapestry was woven according to the catalogue raisonné, « Cadmée » is representative of the artist’s style around 1970 where the recurrent design motif is the square used in superpositions.
       
    Bibliography : Claude Loewer, l’évasion calculée : travaux de 1939 à 1993, catalogue raisonné des tapisseries de 1953 à 1974, Sylvio Acatos, Charlotte Hug, Walter Tschopp and Marc-Olivier Wahler, Artcatos, 1994, n°118
  • Le royal (King pheasant)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Simone André workshop. With signed label. Circa 1965.  
    Edmond Dubrunfaut can be considered as the great 20th century renovator of the Belgian tapestry tradition. He founded a weavers’ workshop in Tournai as early as 1942, then, in 1947, created the Centre de Rénovation de la Tapisserie de Tournai. He produced for various Belgian workshops (Chaudoir, de Wit,...) numerous cartoons destined notably to adorn Belgian embassies throughout the world. Moreover, Dubrunfaut was a teacher of monumental art forms at the Academie des Beaux-Arts de Mons from 1947 to 1978 and then, in 1979, contributed to the creation of the Fondation de la tapisserie, des arts du tissu et des arts muraux de Tournai, a veritable heritage centre for the art of the tapestry in Wallonie. His style, characterised by figuration, strong colour contrasts, draws direct inspiration from nature and animal life (as with Perrot, for example, this artist has a net predilection for birdlife).   Both the subject and the bright blue background are an echo of Perrot’s work. Also characteristic of Dubrunfaut are the feather-leaves : the animal clothes itself in vegetation.
  • le verveux, variante (fyke net, variation)

     
    Tapestry probably woven in Aubusson. Circa 1947.
        An enthusiastic mural artist as early as 1937 (he participated in the Exposition Internationale), Lagrange designed his first cartoons in 1945, and became one of the founding members of the A.P.C.T. His early cartoons were expressionist (like Matégot and Tourlière), then his work evolved towards a stylisation (dating from his collaboration with Pierre Baudouin) which would bring him in the 1970’s to a highly refined style using very pure colours. As well as his important rôle in the tapestry renaissance movement of the period (and the state commissions that went with it), Lagrange would become a teacher at the Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts, a regular collaborator with Jacques Tati, a designer of monumental elements incorporated in various architectural projects and a recognised painter close to Estève and Lapicque.   « Le verveux » [the fyke net] a large-scale tapestry measuring 203 x 285 cm, woven in the Tabard workshop (and whose cartoon is kept at the cité de la Tapisserie in Aubusson) is a work characteristic of Lagrange’s early style both by its theme (the anachronistic realism of evoking disappearing trades practised by simple people), and its expressionist style. This variant returns to the theme in a smaller scale version with only one human figure and a different colour scheme, however some details remain : the oil lamp, the brightly coloured fish lying on the seabed...     Bibliography : Exhibition Catalogue Lagrange, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, 1987 Robert Guinot, Jacques Lagrange, les couleurs de la vie, Lucien Souny editeur, 2005 J.J. et B. Wattel, Jacques Lagrange et ses toiles : peintures, tapisseries, cinéma, Editions Louvre Victoire, 2020
  • Composition

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. n°EA. Circa 1960.
       
    Fumeron designed his first cartoons (he would ultimately make over 500) in the 1940’s, in collaboration with the Pinton workshop, he was then commissioned on numerous occasions by the state before participating in the decoration of the ocean liner “France”. His work was figurative to begin with and influenced by Lurçat, then turned towards abstraction, before coming back to a style characterised by colourful figurative and realistic depictions from the 1980’s onwards.   An abstract cartoon, typical of the artist’s work, in a style (and a colour scheme !) which are redolent of Borderie or Wogensky, and whose works produced at this time have nothing of which to be ashamed when compared with those of his contemporaries.
     
  • Crescendo

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. With label, n°2/6. Circa 1980.
        Best known as an engraver, Davo reproduces in tapestry the result of his research in that medium, based on the oxydation of different metals placed on the copper plate. The resulting effects are here translated by the difference of relief obtained by different weaving techniques.  
    This tapestry is reproduced in the publication « Tapisserie d’Aubusson » produced by the Guéret Chamber of Commerce and Industry at the beginning of the 1980’s to illustrate the technical prowess of the Aubusson tapestry workshops.
     
  • L'oiseau flamme (the flame bird)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Berthaut workshop. With signed label. Circa 1960.       Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   This lyrebird  motif dates from 1954 and is taken from a larger and richer design incorporating a garden « à la française ». Picart le Doux habitually recycled elements from earlier designs.     Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Joufray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980          
  • Sirocco

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. N°2/6. Circa 1990.
        Despite considering herself first and foremost a sculptor, Hedva Ser also produced some cartoons, woven at the Four workshop in Aubusson, which evoke atmospheric scenes (there are also “Esterel”, “Pampa”, “Océan”...), where clouds, reflections, waves and dunes... are represented by the effective use of different threads and stitches.  
     
     
  • Buisson d'algues (seaweed bush)

        Tapestry woven by the Baudonnet workshop. With signed label. 1967.   Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons…), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département … In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars…), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds…), man, literary quotation …   Coral and seaweed had already appeared in his work (in  « Univers marin » for example in 1961), but here the motif is more burgeoning ; the same year, Picart le Doux also produced « les algues vertes » [green seaweed], “abysses”, still exploiting the same (sub-)marine preoccupation. According to Bruzeau, a copy of “Buisson d’algues” hung in the artist’s studio.     Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Joufray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972, n°163 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980    
  • Un Matin (One morning)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. N°EA2/2. 1984.
       
    An artistic all-rounder, who defined himself as “neither a painter, nor a draughtsman, nor a poster artist, nor a writer, nor an engraver. My work is neither abstract nor figurative ... I do not pretend to understand my images, and everyone is free to understand them as they like. I have merely tried to represent my own imaginings, in the hope that others will be able to recognise their own in them”, Folon was an incredibly successful artist, from his illustrations for famous American magazines in the 1960’s, his many poster designs, the works he presented at the Biennials in Venice and in Sao Paolo to the television credits for Antenne 2,... There is therefore no reason to be surprised that he also turned his hand to tapestry design (his largest piece, 80m2 is exhibited at the Centre des Congrès in Monaco, woven, as all his other works in the genre, by the Four workshop), in his characteristic airy and understated style whose inspiration is not a thousand miles from that of his compatriot Magritte.   The aesthetic employed in our tapestry is directly descended from watercolour (pale colours that melt into one another), his preferred medium (there is also a lithograph), which makes his work specific and a world away from that of  other painter-cartoonists of the same period. The representation of the sun as an eye,a leitmotiv in Folon’s work, overlooking a desolate land or sea scape, bears witness to the particular dream-like character of the universe his art inhabits.
        Bibliography : Léon-Louis Sosset, Contemporary tapestries in Belgium, Perron, 1989, ill. p.138  
  • Contre-jour (backlighting)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. With label, n°1/5. Circa 1970.
       
    Marc Petit met Jean Lurçat in 1954, went to Aubusson in 1955, exhibited his work for the first time at La Demeure in 1956, became a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) in 1958. After this lightning start to his career, he produced hundreds of cartoons, in a style all his own, where stilt-walkers and acrobats wend in and out of dreamscapes.   Marc Petit’s collaboration with the Verrière Gallery in Lyon dates from the end of the 1960’s and several exhibitions were devoted to his work there. This tapestry is characteristic with its flat coloured surfaces and limited number of strongly-contrasted colours exploring a habitual theme of this artist : the rising (or setting) sun.
     
  • Jardin sauvage (wild garden)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Glaudin-Brivet workshop. With signed label, n°4/4. Circa 1970.           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,…) from whence he came.   Here is a thoroughly characteristic cartoon of this artist who specialises in pastures, hedges and woodland scenes.
  • Composition

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Rivière des Borderies workshop. Circa 1950.
            A friend of both Bertholle and Le Normand, with whom he  produced several frescoes in the 1940’s, Idoux produced his first tapestry cartoon in 1946 and joined the A.P.C.T. in 1951. His tapestries, where geometrical and optical effects resonate in a grand harmony (and this is only the beginning of the 1950’s!) hark back to his work in stained glass (the church of Notre Dame in Royan for example). As a confirmation of his meteoric rise in the world of tapestry (producing around twenty cartoons in ten years), official recognition came with a commission for two tapestries “Jardin Magique” and “Fée Mirabelle” which were created for the 1st class saloon of the Atlantic ocean liner “France” (“Jardin Magique” is now kept at the eco-museum in St Nazaire).    
  • Faisan d'ombre (Shadow pheasant)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Caron workshop. With signed label. Circa 1950.
      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 Gobelins, 2016technical 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.   In Lurçat’s work, the motif of the cockerel can appear under different monikers : peacock, pheasant (limiting ourselves to the ornithological, because when the plastic representation presents symbolical value the variations are infinite). As for the use of a negative outline, it is a technique used also in the piece entitled “coq dentelle” [lacy cockerel] (a piece in its own right playing on different textiles) dating from 1946.           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, Denise Majorel, une vie pour la tapisserie, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, ill. p.59 Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013, ill. fig. 154 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016  
  • Soleil couchant (Sunset)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With signed label. Circa 1950.
        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.   The motif of the owl with outstretched wings figuring as a protective guardian, is found in his work from the 1950's onward. Interestingly, one of the most iconic photographs of the artist shows him, arms akimbo, but with his hands on his bald head, positioned below and in front of just such a bird.     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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016      
  • Bel oiseau querelleur (beautiful, quarrelsome bird)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. With label. 1948.
      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.   This tapestry quotes a line from Aragon's poem « Coq », which was more lengthily quoted in « Oiseau de toutes les couleurs »  (multicoloured bird) (a cartoon from 1948 of which one example is on show at the Cité de la Tapisserie in Aubusson). The use of text as an element of design is recurrent in Lurçat's work ; in this instance it unites the thematic and the symbolic (the cock), the political and the historical (the Resistance and the French Communist Party).     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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016
  • Le village d'Eze (the village of Eze)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Jean Laurent workshop. N°3/6. Circa 1980.
        In a decorative post-cubist style redolent of Toffoli, Raymond Poulet here interprets one of the most spectacular locations on the côte
     
  • Oiseaux (birds)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Tapisseries de France cooperative. 1952.
            Perrot began his career as a cartoon designer at the end of the war, making almost 500 cartoons including numerous commissions from the state, most of which were woven at Aubusson. His style which is particularly rich and decorative is eminently recognisable : a crowd of butterflies or birds, most often, stands out against a background of vegetation, reminiscent of the millefleurs tapestries (which would also inspire Dom Robert).   If in Perrot's tapestries birds are often present (almost a trademark !) the use of landscape as a background is much rarer despite the artist having produced numerous works in gouache of his travels (Doubs, Auvergne, Collioure, the Canaries...), works which, despite their sensitivity, remain essentially little known.   Bibliography : Tapisseries, dessins, peintures, gravures de René Perrot, Dessein et Tolra, 1982      
  • Ecume (foam)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Picaud workshop. With label, n°2/6. 1974.       Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   This cartoon returns, in a slightly varied form (particularly the use of the text taken from Saint-John Perse, which gives its name to the tapestry) to Et la mer au matin (Bruzeau n°153) woven for the ocean liner “Pasteur” of the “Messageries Maritimes” company in 1966.         Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Joufray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980 Exhibition catalogue Picart le Doux, château d'Olonne, 1992, ill. on front cover
  • Le faucon (the falcon)

     
    Aubusson tapestry. 1947.
        Elie Maingonnat governed the Ecole Nationale des Arts Décoratifs d’Aubusson from 1930 until 1958 where he took over from Marium Martin (who already recommended the use of a limited number of colours and the use of hachures, a similar technique to hatching) of whom he was a pupil. As well as assuming the responsibilities of his position, Maingonnat devoted himself to designing cartoons : motifs of dense vegetation animated by the presence of a few animals, both of which were inspired by the flora and fauna of the Limousin area of France revitalising the traditional theme of greenery used in the XVIIth and XVIIIth centuries.   One more cartoon typical of Maingonnat’s vision, rather repetitive but quite charming : the same tapestry, but of a different format and in a rather brighter colour scheme, is on display at the Mobilier National, Paris.   Bibliography : Exhibition Catalogue Elie Maingonnat, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, 1986-1987
  • Sphinx jaune (yellow hawk moth)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With illegible label. Circa 1950.
        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.   The motif of the butterfly is closely associated with his trip to Latin America and often figures in the exotic designs that were inspired by it. On occasion Lurçat  designed vertical, oversized « portraits » of butterflies (« Sphinx bleu », « sphinx et coq ».... ), in a striking departure from scaled representation.     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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016
  • Chevaux en Camargue ( Horses in Camargue)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. N°1/6. Circa 1980.
        Although Brayer designed on occasion large-scale mural pieces (notably sets for the Paris Opera), he did not devote much of his time to tapestry  : the works he produced in this particular domain are in fact reproductions of pre-existing paintings featuring typically provençal subjects.
  • Le grand  été (a great summer)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With signed label. 1957.
        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.   Although here the title evokes a season, in the piece itself Lurçat seems rather to evoke a certain exoticism : his travels in Latin America in the mid 1950's inspired numerous cartooons featuring humming-birds, butterflies and exuberant vegetation.     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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016
  • Marchande d'illusions (the dream vendor)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With label. Circa 1955.
     
    Elie Grekoff, whose aesthetic is similar to that of Lurçat, designed over 300 cartons “The dream vendor” is typical of a vein characteristic of Grekoff where melancholic children consider each other, as in a scene on a stage, redolent of an illustration for a folk tale.  
  • Reflets d'argent (silver reflections)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With signed label. Circa 1960.
       
    Fumeron designed his first cartoons (he would ultimately make over 500) in the 1940’s, in collaboration with the Pinton workshop, he was then commissioned on numerous occasions by the state before participating in the decoration of the ocean liner “France”. His work was figurative to begin with and influenced by Lurçat, then turned towards abstraction, before coming back to a style characterised by colourful figurative and realistic depictions from the 1980’s onwards.   The vertical fronds, through which fish weave in and out, partially hide a flaming red sun : in this piece we recognise all the elements of Fumeron’s characteristically fantastical vision.
     
  • Composition

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Jean Laurent workshop. N°2/6. Circa 1980.
          A former student at the ENAD in Aubusson, Lartigaud created his first  tapestry cartoon in 1968. He went on to design hundreds more, most of them woven by the  Four Workshop, in an abstract style occasionally studded with celestial bodies.
     
  • L'oiseau d'argent ( the silver bird)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by Jane Perathon's workshop. With signed label, n°6 Circa 1970.
      Jane Perathon was chief weaver in her Aubusson workshop (amongst others she wove designs for Lurçat) ; she also (as did other weavers, Hecquet for example) designed several cartoons of her own.
  • Régates (regattas)

          Aubusson tapestry woven by the Glaudin-Brivet workshop. With signed label, n°EA. Circa 1980.           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,…) from whence he came. Chaye settled in Honfleur in 1964 and this inspired him to produce numerous cartoons relating to the maritime activity in the Seine estuary, in a similar vein to André Hambourg in his paintings.
  • Féérie automnale (automn wonder)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Andraud workshop. With label, n°EA2. 1977.
        A student of Léon Detroy, Gaston Thiéry is one of the last representatives of the Crozant school of painting. Estalished in the Creuse region of France, he started working on tapestries in 1965 with the Andraud workshop for whom he designed cartoons inspired by the local flora, in a decorative style which can be situated somewhere between that of Dom Robert and Maingonnat, a world away from his landscape paintings which were strongly influenced by the impressionists.  
     
  • La nuit (the night)

       
    Tapestry woven by Claire Rado's workshop. With signed label. Circa 1965.
        In 1964 Claire Rado designed and wove in her workshop in Suresnes, her very first tapestry which she then exhibited at the Galerie La Demeure. She weaves her own cartoons, but, rather like Daquin or Coffinet for example, also produces the work of others (Soulages notably as far as Rado is concerned). Her first abstract works were followed by monumental woven figures around which she left the warp bare.   A tapestry dating from the artist’s early work, where the subject is chosen and dealt with to contribute to her technical skills.
  • Paris moderne (modern Paris)

     
    Tapestry woven by the Colombes workshop for ART (Atelier de Rénovation de la Tapisserie). 1945.
        Little is known about the artist, but she created a number of cartoons, which would be woven by Antoine Behna’s ART workshop. The panoramic topographical view was one of the specialities of the workshop, “Paris moderne” being a sort of riposte to Bobot's “Vieux Paris 1650”.  An example of each of these tapestries was offered as a gift to President Truman.   Bibliography : G. Janneau, A. Behna, Tapisseries de notre temps, 1950, ill. n°3 Millon-Robert sale catalogue 3.10.1990 n°1, 31
  • Chimie (chemistry)

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop for the Verrière gallery. With signed label, n°1/6. Circa 1970.     With a taste for the large-scale, influenced by Untersteller at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, Hilaire undertook numerous mural paintings. In the same vein, beginning in 1949, along with a number of other artists stimulated by Lurçat, (he would join the latter at the A.P.C.T. Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) he designed a number of cartoons some of which were woven at Beauvais or at Les Gobelins.   Hilaire's style occasionally comes close to abstraction, no doubt particularly when  he has been asked to evoke a science. In 1974 he imagined another, notably different, tapestry on the same subject for the University of Toulouse (https://www.univ-tlse3.fr/upsart/oeuvre6_565774.html).   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Hilaire, œuvre tissé, galerie Verrière, 1970 Exhibition catalogue, du trait à la lumière, Musée Départemental Georges de la Tour at Vic-sur-Seille, 2010.
  • Coq sabreur (fighting cock)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. With signed label. 1961.
        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.   In the long and varied genealogy of Lurçat's representations of the cock, this « fighting cock » (possible tautology?) is a late production (1961), but it is in fact a partial (and reversed) reproduction of « Guerrier » (warrior) a much earlier piece, which explains the presence of tricolour elements typical of Lurçat's  productions of the war years. Another copy of this piece is kept at the Cité de la Tapisserie in Aubusson.   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, Denise Majorel, une vie pour la tapisserie, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, ill. p.59 Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013, ill. fig. 154 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016
  • Sarabande

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With label. 1954.
            After the traditional completion of some mural paintings in the 1930’s, he then arrived in Aubusson in 1936, became closely associated with Picart le Doux in 1947 and then joined the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie). From then on he devoted himself to tapestry with zeal and designed 167 cartoons, at first figurative following on from Picart le Doux and Saint-Saëns, then, influenced by the scientific themes that he dealt with, tending more towards abstraction. In 1981, two years before his death, he donated his studio to the Musée départemental de la tapisserie in Aubusson.   Already, before « Passacaille » which would be produced in 1955, Jullien here reveals his interest in dance and music, recurrent themes although rarely illustrated in such an explicit way, with the guitar and oboe playing as if by magic. Might it be that the notes of the sheet-music are suggested by the bird outlines pictured along the parchment-phylactery ?         Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Hommage à Louis-Marie Jullien, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1983
     
  • Haute flamme (High flame)

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Goubely workshop. N°4/4. 1966.     I became interested in the art of tapestry particularly because I was excited by the numbered cartoon technique consisting of the fabrication of a mental coloured image using a code…. Tapestry is an essential exercise. As I practised it, it is perhaps the desire to interrogate, down to the finest detail, a work which exists in two dimensions.” (quoted in the exhibition  catalogue, Prassinos, rétrospective de l’oeuvre peint et dessiné, Puyricard, 1983). So much for the artist’s manifesto.  Prassinos designed his first cartoons in 1951 (most of which, around 150, would be woven in the Goubely workshop); then he joined the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie). After several cartoons taking birds as their theme, Prassinos, like several other artists, despite being close to Lurçat, (Matégot, Wogensky…) turned resolutely towards abstraction, in a very personal style where sinuous shapes entwine in contrasting colours (often following a scheme of black-red-brown-beige).     In a way there is in this cartoon a return to the figurative. However, more probably, the artist’s characteristic formal and chromatic conceptions are here allowed retrospectively to incarnate something which is generally, and paradoxically, impossible to represent and thus become conflagration, flame, wild fires (in Greece ? the Alpilles ?)     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Mario Prassinos, tapisseries monumentales, Abbaye de Montmajour, Arles, 1974 Mario Prassinos, œuvre tissé, La Demeure, 1974, n°72 (Ill.) Exhibition catalogue Mario Prassinos, Tapisseries , Aubusson, Musée départemental de le Tapisserie, 1984 Exhibition catalogue Prassinos, Tapisseries, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1988
  • Coucher de soleil sur l'Orient (eastern sunset)

      Aubusson tapestry woven by the Four workshop. With  label, n°3/6. Circa 1990.
          Toffoli produced a large number of tapestries in collaboration with the Robert Four workshop from 1976 onwards, designing several hundred cartoons. In them we find post-cubist transparent effects which are characteristic of the artist, as indeed are the subjects treated. Thus Toffoli’s tapestries do not differ from his painting : travelling for inspiration, here he illustrates  junks observed during trips to the far East.
  • Le secret (the secret)

      Tapestry woven by the Saint-Cyr workshop. With signed label, n°I/VI. Circa 1970.
            Having established himself in the 1930's in the region around Nantes, Morin worked as an artist in  advertising as well as painting and engraving, at first in a figurative style and then evolving towards abstraction from 1954 onwards. His interest in monumental art is revealed in his use of mosaic (particularly within the framework  of the government  1% subsidy for art in works produced for schools of the greater Nantes area) but also in tapestry.  As early as 1952 he received the first commissions for religious-themed works which would be produced by the Plasse le Caisne workshop (who also worked for Manessier, Le Moal...), before collaborating with Pierre Daquin's Atelier de Saint-Cyr, a major player in the French movement for la Nouvelle Tapisserie, and having several pieces exhibited at the Demeure gallery. From then onwards, until 1982, other designs would be produced by the workshops of the Ecole Regionale des Beaux-Arts in Angers, and later by the artist's own daughter who was herself a weaver.   In his collaboration with Daquin (as in the latter's own works) the medium became one with the message, the technical mastery was absolute : the surfaces are animated and vibrant with a complexity of different textures and stitches... and Morin's poetic designs with their delicately symetrical signs, found an ideal expression.
  • Métamorphoses (metamorphosis)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop, for the Compagnie des Arts Français. With illegible label. Circa 1950.
        A disciple of Jacques Adnet, Pothier produced his first cartoons (of which « Metamorphoses » is one) for the former, woven in the Pinton workshop for the Compagnie des Arts français, before moving on to produce 5 more for the Manufactures Nationales. His work which is exuberant, dense, strongly influenced by surrealism but also references Arcimboldo (a claim he made himself), is like no other. It does however inevitably refer back, like other artists working at the same time and in the same domain, to the mille-fleurs style of the middle ages.   To these diverse influences (which give a strange dreamlike quality to this cartoon) Pothier brings, in « Métamorphoses », his predilection for a limited colour palette (3 distinct hues !) and a sense of humour (the discreet signature incorporated into the body of the figure (?) on the left). This design would be reversed and enlarged in the tapestry (woven in 1961 at Les Gobelins) « Madrépores en fleurs ».  
  •  Coquillage étoilé II (Starry seashell II)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Picaud workshop. With label signed by the artist, n°2/6. Circa 1975.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   « Coquillage étoilé » (Starry seashell) dates from 1959 and thenceforth the motif reappears regularly, in « l’Eau et le Feu » (Water and Fire) (1959), « la Mer et la Terre » (Sea and Land) (1960) or « l’Homme et la Mer » (The man and the sea) (1964)… as an evocation of the sea. This cartoon places the motif at the centre whilst another tapestry, with the same name, uses a vertical format.   Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Joufray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980  
  • Les buveurs (the drinkers)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Tabard workshop. 1944.
        Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design...) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology... refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate.   “The original copy of Les Buveurs (The Drinkers) was commissioned by a friend of the artist.. The cartoon of Les Buveurs, of which 8 copies were produced kept recurring like a rotten apple in the correspondance between Tabard and Saint-Saëns, because of the cost of the weaving. Les Buveurs reflects a solid joie de vivre and can be seen as one more  emanation of the rich theme of the vine and the Seasons ...”  (Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapisseries, 1935-1979, Angers, p.26). The thematic contrast with the artist’s previous cartoons is striking : Orion, Thésée, les vierges folles, ... The lightness of touch found here will also be found in Le Braconnier (The Poacher) or Le Bouquet (The bouquet).   A copy of this tapestry figured in the 1946 exhibition at the Musée National d’Art Moderne “La Tapisserie française du moyen-âge à nos jours” (n°297)     Bibliography : Jean Lurçat, Tapisserie Française, Bordas, 1947, ill. pl.42 Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, galerie La Demeure, 1970 Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, the tapestries, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapestries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1997-1998, ill.  p.26 Exhibition catalogue Tissages d’ateliers, tissages d’artistes, dix ans d’enrichissement des collections, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 2004, ill. p.85
  • Tauromachie (bullfighting)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Rivière des Borderies workshop. 1946.
        Perrot began his career as a cartoon designer at the end of the war, making almost 500 cartoons including numerous commissions from the state, most of which were woven at Aubusson. His style which is particularly rich and decorative is eminently recognisable : a crowd of butterflies or birds, most often, stands out against a background of vegetation, reminiscent of the millefleurs tapestries (which would also inspire Dom Robert).   This tapestry is atypical in Perrot’s production : an audaciously strident choice of colours, an unusually sober motif whose singular theme, including human figures, is treated almost choreographically ; we are close here to the vision of Saint-Saëns. Perhaps then this particular design was specially commissioned ?     Bibliography : Tapisseries, dessins, peintures, gravures de René Perrot, Dessein et Tolra, 1982          
  • Plein vol (Full flight)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. With label, n°2/6. 1982.
       
    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.”   The omnipresent theme of the bird in Wogensky’s work is, more often than not, treated in an abstract way which emphasises its kinetic qualities : lines, trajectories, force, energy,... are the words used by critics and commentators in their descriptions. However, and notably in “Plein vol” (and also in “Plein ciel”, a reversed smaller version), at the beginning of the 1980’s, the artist reverts to a more figurative treatment where wings, beaks and tails are once again discreetly discernible.     Bibliography : Exhibition Catalogue Tapisseries d’Aubusson, Galerie d’art municipale, Luxembourg, 1982, ill. n°35 Collectif, Tapisserie d’Aubusson, Association du développement du pays d’Aubusson, 1983, ill. p.48 Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, 1989 Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1989-1990, ill. p.40
           
  • Serpent d'étoiles (serpent of stars)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Tabard workshop. With signed label. 1961.
            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.”   « Serpent d’étoiles » (Serpent of stars) references the constellation Serpens (but also inevitably Giono’s novel of the same name), at a time (the 1960’s) when his out and out lyricism led him to the evocation of celestial bodies, space, the galaxies ; from “Cassiopée” in 1961, “Chant des étoiles” in 1962 (which figured at the Biennale de Lausanne),  to “Galaxie”  (1970) now in the collection of the French Senate. A similar tapestry figures in the the collection of the Conseil Régional du Limousin.     Bibliography : Exhibition Catalogue Robert Wogensky, tapisseries, Galerie la Demeure, 1962, ill. Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, 1989 Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1989-1990, ill. p.20 Exhibition Catalogue Dialogues avec Lurçat, Musées de Basse-Normandie, 1992, ill. p.73 Gérard Denizeau, Denise Majorel, une vie pour la tapisserie, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, ill. p.67    
  • Jeux interplanétaires (interplanetary games)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the  Four workshop. With label, n°EA. Circa 1970.
        A former student at the ENAD in Aubusson, Lartigaud created his first  tapestry cartoon in 1968. He went on to design hundreds more, most of them woven by the  Four Workshop, in an abstract style occasionally studded with celestial bodies.
     
  • L'étang (the pond)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the  Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°6/6. Circa 1970.
       
      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.   An exact reproduction of the cartoon “Nénuphars” (waterlilies), the only difference being the change of the background colour from the original green.  
  • Soleil d'hiver (Winter sun)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. N°1/1. Circa 1980.
          Michel Degand, is an artist who expresses himself in many different media (painting, sculpture, illustration,…) and who has in 50 creative years, conceived  over a hundred tapestry cartoons, whose inspiration is perpetually evolving, sometimes dreamlike or cosmic (reminiscent of Wogensky), at other times « technological » (like Millecamps), often lyrical, with a marked interest in the material itself, and most of his work has been woven in the Pinton workshop at Felletin.   The sun is a regular leitmotiv for this artist ; but in this fragmented composition he works in fragments of older tapestries (using finer stiching), as would Sautour-Gaillard in the 1990’s, making them appear to be glued into the original motif, a technique which results in thought-provoking juxtapositions.
  • Composition

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With label signed with the artist's stamp, n°1/6. Circa 1990.
            A major actor in the kinetic art movement (and more particularly lumino-kinetic art), the inventor of “spacio-dynamism” which was intrinsically linked to technological innovations and engineering discoveries of the 60’s and 70’s (information technology...), Schöffer is best known for his scaffolding-sculptures, which he would have liked to develop on a grander, architectural scale (a project existed for a tower in the Défense neighbourhood next to Paris). His multidisciplinary pieces (collaborations with Boulez, Barrault and Béjart), his attachment to the idea of “art total”, and the affirmed desire of public bodies of the period to support kinetic and technological art lead to him being sought out by the centre for textile research of the Mobilier National, for whom he would produce “Murlux”, a work of iinterweaving plastic tubes, set in a metal frame, where the effect of light passing through the structure could be explored by the spectator from all angles. This piece would not be followed by further development of the theme but 2 other cartoons were produced by the Manufactures Nationales (“Vartap I and II”), in a rather less challenging optical art style redolent of Vasarely or d’Agam.     This cartoon lies somewhere between the projects described above : the materials used are undeniably associated with the medium (even though there is an abundant presence of  metal threads), and the piece is definitely two-dimensional; however, the strips and indentations are a throw-back to the heterogeneous constructions of the artist’s sculptures (even though the underlying principle is one of symmetry) : an exceptional cartoon which is a rare illustration of the work of a profoundly original artist.
  • L'oiseau lyre (the lyrebird)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With label signed by the artist, n°3/6. Circa 1960.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   This lyrebird  motif dates from 1954 and is taken from a larger and richer design incorporating a garden « à la française ». Picart le Doux habitually recycled elements from earlier designs.   Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Joufray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Deux lumières (two lights)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Goubely-Gatien workshop. With signed label. Circa 1955.
          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.   Lurçat here adds to his traditional scattered and busy motifs (stars, fish, butterflies…) 2 rays of sunlight (giving the work its name) which in their intersecting beams alter significantly the colours : difficult to imagine a better way to illustrate the danger of sunlight for the conservation of tapestries (another cartoon, « Coup de soleil » (previously in my possession) illustrates this theme in an even more explicit fashion,     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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016
  • La voix du reliquaire (the voice of the reliquary)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°1/3. 1975.
       
    Sautour-Gaillard had his first cartoon woven in 1971 by the Legoueix workshop (a collaboration which was to last), and from then on he designed many very large-scale projects of which the most spectacular was “Pour un certain idéal” a series of 17 tapestries dealing with the theme of Olympianism (property of the Musée de l’Olympisme in Lausanne). If at first close to lyrical abstraction, the artist produced in the 1990’s cartoons superimposing different decorative motifs, textures and figures whose unity originated in the woven texture itself.   « La voix du reliquaire » reveals a certain proximity of the artist, in his early work, to the abstract world of Soulages or Schneider. We recognise, transposed into the wool medium, the gestures,the overflows, characteristic of the artists of the “envolée lyrique”, in a severely limited range of colours.   Bibliography : D. Cavelier, Jean-René Sautour-Gaillard, la déchirure, Lelivredart, 2013, ill.p.163
  • Equinoxe

     
    Tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. With label. Circa 1945.
            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.   In a sobre and carefully nuanced colour scheme, the familiar motif of the laid table here takes on a new resonance, as though crushed beneath the rays of an equinoctial sun, replacing the habitual still life motifs : game, lobsters, a mandoline.     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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016
  • Voyages, le 3e millénaire (Travelling, the 3rd millenium)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Fadat workshop. With signed certificate, n°1/1. 2000.
          Carzou was most noted at the start of his career as a decorative painter (notably for the theatre), and his work for tapestry is relatively rare and only produced by Pierre de Tartas. His style is immediately recognisable in this cartoon, the busy hatching illustrating dream-like subjects : the theme here is a retake on the (only) cartoon by Carzou woven by the Manufactures Nationales, « L’invitation au voyage ». At the dawn of the 3rd millenium (and only a few months before his death), the artist, who was a regular critic of contemporary society, has a singular vision of the future of travel, envisioned as ballooning and sailing ships.
  • Source claire (clear spring)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the  Bonjour workshop. With signed label, n°3/4. Circa 1960.
       
    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.
    A classic cartoon in the naturalistic vein of this particular artist, who made a speciality of enclosures, hedges and riverbanks with animals.  
  • Chèvrefeuilles (Honeysuckle/Goats and leaves)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Goubely workshop. With signed label, n°1. 1973.     A Benedictine monk and an illuminator, Dom Robert met Jean Lurçat in 1941 at the Abbey of En Calcat : while he never abandoned drawing (his watercolours, painted to life, would serve him as a reservoir of ideas for his tapestries), his work as a cartoonist (he was a member of the A.P.C.T. from its inception) would take on a considerable importance (at least a hundred cartoons, all numbered) and would be highly thought of.  His immediately recognisable style, absence of  perspective¸motifs inspired from the natural world (in a Paradisiac style) where stylised flora and fauna combine in a festive and extrovert exuberance, where the influence of mediaeval tapestry can be clearly felt ; poetic and colourful, Dom Robert’s cartoons are the incarnation of their author’s spiritual asceticism. Inaugurated in the Spring of 2015, the musée Dom Robert opened its doors in in the monastery-school in Sorèze in the department of the Tarn.   Goats and foliage in all their variety, rather than « Honeysuckle » (Chèvre means goat and feuille means leaf in French n.tr.), Dom Robert was never one to turn his back on the possibility of a pun (as in “Plein champ” meaning Open field but to the ear it can be confused with Plainchant tr.n.). It is interesting that a goat appears also in that tapestry design from 1970. Here, on a uniquely large scale for this subject, the goats are displayed against an autumnal background, a reference to “l’Automne” (Autumn) which was the last of the series The Seasons completed in 1943. A similar design is on display at the Cité Internationale de la Tapisserie in Aubusson.   Bibliography : Exhibition Catalogue Dom Robert, tapisseries récentes, galerie la Demeure, 1974, ill. p.15, cartoon p.23 Multi-authored, Dom Robert, Tapisseries, Editions Julliard, 1980, ill p.70-71, detail on front cover, cartoon p.85 Multi-authored, Dom Robert, Tapisseries, Editions Siloë-Sodec, 1990, ill. P.62-67 Exhibition Catalogue, Dom Robert, œuvre tissé, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, 1990 Exhibition Catalogue, Hommage à Dom Robert, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, Aubusson, 1998 Multi-authored, la clef des champs, Dom Robert, Editions Privat, 2003, ill. p.124 Multi-authored, les saisons de Dom Robert, Tapisseries, Editions Hazan, 2014, ill p.164-167 B. Ythier, Guide du visiteur, Cité Internationale de la tapisserie d’Aubusson, ill. p.65 R. Guinot, hors-série la Montagne, une Cité pour la tapisserie d’Aubusson, 2018, ill. p.82 Multi-authored, la tapisserie française, Editions du Patrimoine, 2017, ill. 312-313
  • Eléctricité (electricity)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°1/6. 1970.
        Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design…) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology… refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate.   « Lightning » [another title for this cartoon] … bears witness to a new departure for Saint-Saëns, already visible in the 1960’s ; an evocation of cosmic forces [or rather as in this case , physical phenomena] not so much suggested by the drawing’s precision so much as by the strident colours employed…. This tapestry was used for the poster advertising the inauguration of the Aérospatiale Cultural Centre in Toulouse in 1971 » according to Michel Heng, in the exhibition catalogue for the Saint-Saëns exhibition in Aubusson.     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, oeuvre tissé, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987, ill. p.47 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapisseries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1997-1998
  • Nachtsonne (Nightsun)

        Tapestry woven by the Münchener Gobelin Manufaktur. With signed label. Circa 1970.      
    Holger was a student at the Ecole Nationale d’Art Décoratif d’Aubusson and worked with Lurçat before the latter’s death in 1966. He designed numerous dream-like cartoons woven by the Aubusson workshop. Now settled in the United States, he remains a tireless advocate for, and witness to, modern tapestry design, organising exhibitions and lectures on the subject.   Some of his cartoons have been woven in the two workshops active in Germany, in Nuremberg and Munich, using Aubusson techniques.
  • Coq rouge (red rooster)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Glaudin-Brivet workshop. n°1/6. 1974.
        Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design…) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology… refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate.   The theme of the cockerel, already present in « réveille-matin » (the alarm clock) in 1959, is something of a rarity in Saint-Saëns’s work (notably when compared with that of Lurçat). In this case the style has much evolved : the forms are supple and sinuous, the colours vivid, the lines uncluttered as if drawn in (red) chalk on a blackboard.     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, oeuvre tissé, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapisseries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1997-1998, ill. p.22
  • La terre et la mer II (Earth and sea II)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Hecquet workshop. With label signed by the artist's widow, n°1/6. 1960.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   This cartoon is a smaller reworking of his original version (170 x 272 cm) dating from 1960. At that time, Picart le Doux was beginning his series of binary tapestries with allegorical associations of different elements. A system was being established (fish + shells = water or the sea, butterflies + roots = the earth) which Picard le Doux would use for the rest of his career.   Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Joufray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972, n°103 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Composition

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With label. Circa 1950.
        On returning to France in the 1950’s after a lengthy period spent in Argentina, Berroeta produced  quite a number of cartoons in a style which was first figurative (animals, human figures,...) then turned to abstraction, as in his paintings.   If he adopts here the motif of fish, very common at the time in contemporary tapestry (cf. Lurçat, Picart le Doux), Berroeta can be considered to have a certain legitimacy in exploiting this subject as it is one he has used on several occasions, in “Mer du Sud” (the south sea) for example.  
  • Garrigue de printemps (spring garrigue)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Jean Laurent workshop. With label, n°3/8. 1976.
        Debiève designed numerous cartoons in a style that is typical of the 1940’s (« le remailleur de filets” the mender of nets, “le potier” the potter,...) although the vast majority were printed on fabric. A notably smaller number of his designs were produced as tapestries in Aubusson and his cartoons are close to the aesthetic of his paintings inspired by Provence.
  • La légende de Saint Hubert (the legend of Saint hubert)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the  Pinton workshop for the Compagnie des Arts Français. 1943.
       
    Adnet, who was placed at the head of the Compagnie des Arts Français in 1928, was keen to reinstate tapestry design as an art, distinct from painting, and a key element in interior decoration, with the constraint of numbered coloured threads (in a very similar approach to that of Lurçat). With this intention he contacted at the same time Despierre, Coutaud, Planson, and Brianchon. Despierre was particularly experienced in the conception of monumental art works (he also designed stained glass windows, mosaics and was a member of staff ,and then head, of mural art at the Ecole nationale des arts décoratifs), after receiving commissions during the war, he would be regularly asked to contribute cartoons to the Manufactures nationales who would go on to produce “la pêche” (fishing) “la chasse” (hunting) “le droit maritime”, (the law of the seas) “le droit industriel et commercial” (industrial and commercial law) through the 1950’s and 60’s.   The bright colours (the clothing of the man on the left, worthy of mannerism!), the dense and monumental style of the figures (typical both of the period and this artist’s personal style), should not be allowed to overshadow the underlying meaning of the tapestry : a religious subject, vector of faith and hope during a troubled period (Saint Saëns, Lurçat also dissembled the symbolic behind the apparent). A paradox if one considers the essentially decorative preoccupations of Adnet.   The Cité de la tapisserie in Aubusson possesses an inverted example of this tapestry, with a different border ; this is the one illustrated in the bibliography.     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue La tapisserie française du moyen âge à nos jours, Musée d’Art Moderne, Paris, 1946, n°247 Heng Michèle, Aubusson et la renaissance de la tapisserie, Histoire de l'art N° 11, 1990, Varia, Fig. 5 page 69 Exhibition catalogue Jean Lurçat, compagnons de route et passants considérables, Felletin, Eglise du château, 1992, ill. p.20-21 Exhibition catalogue Tapisserie et expressions du sacré, Aubusson, musée départemental de la tapisserie, 1999, ill. p.36 Exhibition catalogue Fantastiques chevauchées, le cheval en tapisserie, Aubusson, musée départemental de la tapisserie, 2008, ill.p.63
  • Synthèse  (synthesis)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Hamot workshop. 1961.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   « Synthèse » is a reworking of the motifs in « Cosmogonie » (1948) : an  arrangement of elements representing scientific knowledge, an astrolabe, a compass, a pyramid, a book of natural science...   Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Joufray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966, n°15 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972, n°107 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Joyau (gem)

     
    Tapestry woven by the Braquenié workshop. With label, n°1. Circa 1975.
     
    A rare example of this artist’s work for the loom : in it we  find his characteristically complicated formal arrangements.
  • Le merle blanc (the white blackbird)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. With signed label. Circa 1965.
          Henri Ilhe, who came to the design of tapestry cartoons late on in his career, still managed to produce from 1964 onwards a considerable number (more than 120, all woven by the Tabard workshop) in an urbane style, incorporating birds and butterflies sporting in and around the gnarled branches of trees and bushes.   With this representation of a bird whose rarity value is equal to that of  a five-legged sheep, Ilhe expresses no ornithological pretention, merely an illustration of the natural world as a collection of singular phenomena.  
     
  • Portrait

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With label, n°1/6. Circa 1980.
     
    Doubtless a tapestry woven from a work by Hélène Champaloux (with an X !), in a style reminiscent of posters of the 1970’s, featuring a face treated as if  by solarization : a very rare subject for a tapestry!
  • La nuit s'ouvre (Night opens)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Simone André workshop. With label. Circa 1955.
        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.   Here stylised vegetation, white on a black background (as in Talbot’s  photogrammes), appears as if  torn to reveal a red stain against which is framed an owl : the title suggests hope, however the cartoon announces by its mutedness “the end of everything” as in the “Chant du Monde”. A similar piece is conserved at the Atelier-Musée des Tours Saint Laurent, in Saint-Céré.     Bibliography : Cat. Expo. La tapisserie française, Musée d’art moderne, Paris, 1946 Claude Roy, Jean Lurçat, Pierre Cailler Editeur, 1956, ill. n°113 Cat. Expo. Jean Lurçat tapisseries nouvelles, Maison de la Pensée Française, 1956, n°6 Tapisseries de Jean Lurçat 1939-1957, Pierre Vorms Editeur, 1957, ill. n°109 Cat. Expo. Jean Lurçat, tapisseries de la fondation Rothmans, Musée de Metz, 1969 Cat. Expo. Lurçat, 10 ans après, Musée d’Art moderne de la ville de Paris, 1976, ill. Cat. Expo. Les domaines de Jean Lurçat, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, 1986 Colloque Jean Lurçat et la renaissance de la tapisserie à Aubusson, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1992 Cat. Expo. Dialogues avec Lurçat, Musées de Basse-Normandie, 1992 Cat. Expo. Jean Lurçat, Donation Simone Lurçat, Académie des Beaux-Arts, 2004 Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013, ill. n°131 I. Rooryck, Atelier-Musée départemental Jean Lurçat, 2015, ill. p.14 Cat. Expo. Jean Lurçat, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle, 2016 Cat. Expo. Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016    
  • La loi (Law)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Rivière des Borderies workshop. With label. 1951.
            Perrot began his career as a cartoon designer at the end of the war, making almost 500 cartoons including numerous commissions from the state, most of which were woven at Aubusson. His style which is particularly rich and decorative is eminently recognisable : a crowd of butterflies or birds, most often, stands out against a background of vegetation, reminiscent of the millefleurs tapestries (which would also inspire Dom Robert).   Ornithological representations in all their various manifestations are extremely common in Perrot’s work : for example “la discorde” and “la méditation” designed for the Palais de Justice (High Court) in Paris which are illustrated respectively by grouse and owls. What else to illustrate “La Loi” and inspire respect in the observor than the severe glare of a majestic eagle.

    Bibliography : Tapisseries, dessins, peintures, gravures de René Perrot, Dessein et Tolra, 1982    
  • Reflets (reflections)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With label, n°6/6. Circa 1960.
       
    Fumeron designed his first cartoons (he would ultimately make over 500) in the 1940’s, in collaboration with the Pinton workshop, he was then commissioned on numerous occasions by the state before participating in the decoration of the ocean liner “France”. His work was figurative to begin with and influenced by Lurçat, then turned towards abstraction, before coming back to a style characterised by colourful figurative and realistic depictions from the 1980’s onwards.     Beneath the red sun, fish, insects , a lobster all frolic in a dream-like composition typical of the artist : numerous examples of these motifs can be found for instance in  “Avant l’homme” Before man, woven by the Gobelins  (cf Exhibition Catalogue “le Mobilier National et les Manufactures Nationales des Gobelins et de Beauvais sous la IVe République”, Beauvais 1997)
  • Oiseaux et grappes (birds and bunches)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With label. Circa 1950.
      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.   As always, a synthesis of motifs : vines, bunches of grapes, glasses are habitually displayed on the artist’s lain tables, whilst birds are generally paired with fish. Here the vision is not symbolic but, as suggested by the title, more an evocation of the winegrower’s adversaries.   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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016  
  • Coq (rooster )

     
    Tapestry woven in the Goubely workshop. With  faded label. Circa 1950.
        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.     The cock, in various guises, variously bedecked, playing various roles, is an absolutely central figure in Lurçat’s bestiary, a recurrent motif reappearing in an infinite number of variations : what is particular about this version is the crown of ivy and the feather-leaves both of which are a reference to the animal-vegetable syntheses so characteristic of this artist.     Bibliography : Cat. Expo. La tapisserie française, Musée d’art moderne, Paris, 1946 Tapisseries de Jean Lurçat 1939-1957, Pierre Vorms Editeur, 1957 Cat. Expo. Jean Lurçat, tapisseries de la fondation Rothmans, Musée de Metz, 1969 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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016  
  • L'oeil ébloui (the dazzled eye)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Clochard workshop. With signed label, n°1/6. Circa 1980.
       
    Originally an engraver (Prix de Rome, intaglio technique in 1942), Jean-Louis Viard designed his first tapestry cartoons in the mid 1950’s. At first his work was figurative (he was collaborating at the time with Picart Le Doux), but then he evolved along the same lines as many other painter-cartoonists of the period (Matégot, Tourlière or Prassinos,…) towards abstraction. He produced scores of cartoons working up until the 2000’s, in parallel to his work as a painter and engraver, but throughout revealing a particular interest for the use of contrasting materials and textures in the tradition of the “Nouvelle Tapisserie” of which Pierre Daquin was one of the leading lights.   The inspiration for his motifs, sometimes metaphysical (“Mémoires” Memories, “Destins” Destinies,…) is wide-reaching, from astronomical infinity « ténèbres solaires » solar darkness) to the microscopic (« Mutation végétale” Plant mutation) : a profuse and varied production, regularly exhibited at his home, in various public and private exhibition spaces and, most significantly, at the Salon Comparaison of which he was the curator for the Tapestry section.
  • L'Odyssée (the Odyssey)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With signed label, n°1/6. Circa 1965.
       
    Fumeron designed his first cartoons (he would ultimately make over 500) in the 1940’s, in collaboration with the Pinton workshop, he was then commissioned on numerous occasions by the state before participating in the decoration of the ocean liner “France”. His work was figurative to begin with and influenced by Lurçat, then turned towards abstraction, before coming back to a style characterised by colourful figurative and realistic depictions from the 1980’s onwards.   During the 1960’s Fumeron evolved towards abstraction as did some of his contemporaries (Matégot, Wogensky,...). His compositions of this period are sometimes inspired by literary subjects (Cf. Hamlet) which are interpreted in a kaleidoscope of colours which are immediately recognisable.
  • La branche  (the branch)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Hamot workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist. 1961.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   A cartoon (Bruzeau n° 111) which is typical of the artist in the way it combines the animal and plant kingdoms. The realistic treatment of the bark is in strong contrast with the stylised graphic and dream-like nature of the composition.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • La huppe rouge (the red hoopooe)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Picaud workshop. With signed label, n°3/6. Circa 1970.
     
    Originally from the Limousin region of France (and the daughter of the master glass-blower François Chigot), Delphine Bureau-Chigot devoted a large part of her creative energies (she was also a painter and a pastel artist) to tapestry design (something over a hundred) which were for the most part woven by the Picaud workshop, often evoking a dream-like world where animals (and notably birds) had an important place.
  • Sirius

     
    Portalegre tapestry woven by the Fino workshop. With signed label, n°3/6. Circa 1965.
        Matégot, originally a decorator, then creator of artefacts and furniture (an activity he abandoned in 1959) met François Tabard in 1945 and gave him his first cartoons, first of all figurative then rapidly of abstract design in the 1950’s. He became a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres Cartonniers de Tapisserie) in 1949, participated in many international exhibitions (Matégot, like Lurçat before him, was an untiring advocate of the art of tapestry) fulfilled numerous public commissions, sometimes of monumental proportions (“Rouen” 85m2 for the Préfecture of the Seine Maritime département, and also tapestries for Orly Airport, for the Maison de la Radio, for the IMF...) and designed no fewer than 629 cartoons up until the 1970’s. In 1990 the Matégot foundation for contemporary tapestry was inaugurated in Bethesda, U.S.A. Matégot is an artist, like Wogensky, Tourlière or Prassinos, who turns wool textiles resolutely towards the abstract: at first lyrical, geometric in the 70’s, exploiting various technical aspects of the loom : colour graduations, shading, irregularities...   The lyrical treatment, alternating shadow and light, is characteristic of Matégot’s cartoons of the mid-1960’s : often dark, his tapestries of the period will reveal a shining shard of brightness  : what better than the star Sirius to illustrate this ?     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue, Matégot, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1990-1991 Patrick Favardin, Mathieu Matégot, Editions Norma, 2014
  • La terre de France ne ment pas (French soil doesn't lie)

     
    Aubusson tapestry. 1943.
        François Faureau is a singular figure. Born in Aubusson, he studied at the ENAD, of which at the time the director was Marius Martin who was already promoting the use of thick yarn and counted colours that Lurçat would later adopt. Thus he was a representative of the peintre-cartonniers at the stand of the ENAD at the Exposition internationale des Arts décoratifs in 1925 with his tapestry “Solitude, verdure” or the screen “Canards”, which hesitate between neo-classicism and the influence of cubism. He later founded his own workshop, but his production remained somewhat confidential, and somewhat removed from the protagonists of the “Tapestry Renaissance”.   Although the workshops in Aubusson continued their activity during the occupation (as did the Manufactures Nationales), the production of pieces directly influenced by the imposition of the values of Pétain’s government are rare, despite the fact that this typically traditional skill undoubtedly coincided with the values of what was known at the time as the National Revolution. The famous formula spoken by Maréchal Pétain on 25th June 1940 (although its author was Emmanuel Berl), which went on to become a leitmotiv in the official public discourse, exalting the countryside, society’s peasant roots and, rather more prosaically, agriculture, is illustrated here in a very literal fashion bringing together the various rural tasks, vegetation, architecture and animals... all harmoniously exposed under the protective watch of the Vichy regime.     Provenance : Collection Régine Deforges   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Tapisseries 1925, Aubusson, Cité de la tapisserie, 2012  
  • Orion

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Tabard workshop. 1943.
          Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design...) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology... refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate.     « Orion » was commissioned by Dr. Guilhem, Saint-Saëns’ brother-in-law... The wildly galoping horse carries Orion, the object of Diane’s love, off to the firmament where he will take his place amongst the constellations. The sense of movement, the agitation of the cloth, the rippling muscles of the horseman all anticipate “Thésée et le minotaure”  (Theseus and the minotaur). 12 copies were made of Orion, all by the Tabard workshop, which is an indication of the considerable popularity of this cartoon. (Catalogue of the exhibition Saint-Saëns, oeuvre tissé, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987, p.10) This tapestry is a variant dating from 1943 where Sirius, Orion’s faithful hound, accompanies him (as in astronomy where Sirius, the star, is in close vicinity to the constellation of Orion).   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, oeuvre tissé, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapisseries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1997-1998, ill. p.22  
  • Ville (city)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the  Four workshop. With signed label, n°EA. Circa 1980.  
    A former student at the ENAD in Aubusson, Lartigaud created his first  tapestry cartoon in 1968. He went on to design hundreds more, most of them woven by the  Four Workshop, in an abstract style occasionally studded with celestial bodies.
     
  • Banlieue (Suburbs)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Goubely workshop. With signed label. 1945.
       
    An enthusiastic mural artist as early as 1937 (he participated in the Exposition Internationale), Lagrange designed his first cartoons in 1945, and became one of the founding members of the A.P.C.T. His early cartoons were expressionist (like Matégot and Tourlière), then his work evolved towards a stylisation (dating from his collaboration with Pierre Baudouin) which would bring him in the 1970’s to a highly refined style using very pure colours. As well as his important rôle in the tapestry renaissance movement of the period (and the state commissions that went with it), Lagrange would become a teacher at the Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts, a regular collaborator with Jacques Tati, a designer of monumental elements incorporated in various architectural projects and a recognised painter close to Estève and Lapicque. « Banlieue » the first of my tapestries woven in Aubusson, pictures the work of travelling mattress carders using a curious contraption to comb wool which flies around the streets” explained the artist. In his early works Lagrange in a realistic, almost expressionist, vein deals in themes of life in the suburbs, the people who plied their trades (here in an amusing mise en abyme about working with wool) in daily life (cf also Guignebert “le marché aux puces” “flea market”  which is contemporary) in a completely different style from Lurçat’s cosmology. The tapestry was featured in the 1946 exhibition and two other copies are conserved at the Musée de la Chaux-de-Fonds and the Museum du Pays d’Ussel.   Bibliography : Multi-authored, Muraille et laine, Editions Pierre Tisné, 1946, ill. n°58 Madeleine Jarry, La tapisserie, art du XXe siècle, Office du livre, 1974, ill. n°69 Exhibition Catalogue Lagrange, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, 1987, ill.p.16-17 Exhibition catalogue, Jean Lurçat, compagnons de route et passants considérables, Felletin, Eglise du château, 1992, ill. p.29 Robert Guinot, Jacques Lagrange, les couleurs de la vie, Lucien Souny editeur, 2005, n°28, illustrated Gérard Denizeau, Denise Majorel, une vie pour la tapisserie, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, ill. p.73 J.J. et B. Wattel, Jacques Lagrange ets es toiles : peintures, tapisseries, cinéma, Editions Louvre Victoire, 2020, ill. p.33, 70-71
  • La chouette (the owl )

     
    Tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. With  label. Circa 1945.
        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. This choice of a vertical rectangular format containing a delineated circular motif against a burgundy background recurrs regularly in Lurçat’s work in the later 1940’s (cf. “Bosquet” for example). If the owl motif referred to in the title is indeed often used by Lurçat, in this particular example it more closely resembles a cockerel, another frequently recurring motif, a confusion in which this artist delighted.           Bibliography : Cat. Expo. La tapisserie française, Musée d’art moderne, Paris, 1946 Tapisseries de Jean Lurçat 1939-1957, Pierre Vorms Editeur, 1957 Cat. Expo. Jean Lurçat, tapisseries de la fondation Rothmans, Musée de Metz, 1969 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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016
  • Soleil rouge (Red sun)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the  Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°1/6. Circa 1980.
       
    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. A design which brings together two leitmotivs characteristic of Simon Chaye, a bouquet and a flock of birds, which here detach themselves from a background formed by the red sun.
  • La chouette et l'étang (the owl and the pond)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Simone André workshop. With signed label. Circa 1955.
       
    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.   The owl, almost completely hidden by vegetation, is in apposition to the fish in the pond. The various worlds and elements evoked here : animal, vegetable, air and water...reflect on each other in a syncretism both harmonious and serene.   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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016
  • Courrier Sud (mail heading south)

     
    Aubusson tapestry, woven for Jean Laurent. With label, n°1/6. 1976.
    Better known for his geometrically inspired paintings incorporating on occasion mechanical elements, Gachon who came originally from Aubusson, did however design a certain number of tapestry cartoons. This particular example is somewhat atypical of his work.
  • Bouquet d'octobre (october bouquet)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the  Legoueix workshop. With label, n°5/6. Circa 1980.
     
    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. The theme of the bouquet is omnipresent in Chaye’s work ; it allows him seasonal or chromatic associations of great decorative value.
  • Paysage bleu aux papillons (blue landscape with butterflies)

     
    Tapestry woven by the ATA (Atelier de Tapisserie d'Angers). With signed label, n°1/4. Circa 1970.
     
    Elie Grekoff, whose aesthetic is similar to that of Lurçat, designed over 300 cartons : here we find evidence of the artist’s evolution from the 1960’s onwards, as the human or animal figures disappear from his work. The recurrent theme is one where a heavenl_ bod_ (the sun, the moon) appears half-hidden behind foliage.  
  • Soleil pour Maria Pia (Sun for Maria Pia)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With label, n°1/3. Circa 1970.   Holger was a student at the Ecole Nationale d’Art Décoratif d’Aubusson and worked with Lurçat before the latter’s death in 1966. He designed numerous dream-like cartoons woven by the Aubusson workshop. Now settled in the United States, he remains a tireless advocate for, and witness to, modern tapestry design, organising exhibitions and lectures on the subject.
     
  • Soleil de corail (coral sun)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With signed label. Circa 1960.
       
    Fumeron designed his first cartoons (he would ultimately make over 500) in the 1940’s, in collaboration with the Pinton workshop, he was then commissioned on numerous occasions by the state before participating in the decoration of the ocean liner “France”. His work was figurative to begin with and influenced by Lurçat, then turned towards abstraction, before coming back to a style characterised by colourful figurative and realistic depictions from the 1980’s onwards.   The vertical fronds, through which mottled fish weave in and out, partially hide a flaming red sun : in this piece we recognise all the elements of Fumeron’s characteristically fantastical vision.  
     
  • Bel canto

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Tabard workshop. N°4. 1964.
        Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design…) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology… refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate.   If Music as a theme is ever-present in Saint-Saëns’s work, the changes that his style underwent in the 1960’s towards  a vision that is both more informal and biomorphic, influenced his treatment of it ; but is not the lyricism evident in this piece ideally suited to the expression “Bel Canto” ?     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue La tapisserie française du Moyen-âge à nos jours, Paris, Musée d’art moderne, 1946 Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, Paris, galerie La Demeure, 1970, ill. Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, the tapestries, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapestries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1997-1998
  • Composition

     
    Tapestry woven in the Saint-Cyr workshop. With signed label, n°EA1. Circa 1980.
        It is perhaps the association with Pierre Vago, the architect who was her husband, that inspired Nicole Cormier to take an interest in mural art (cv. “Soleil levant” for the university at Villeneuve d’Ascq) ; in the 1970’s she designed and made hangings sewn from felt and cotton textiles and designed cartoons for tapestries some of which were woven by Pierre Daquin notably.
     
     
  • Coquerelle (Pasque flower)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. With label, n°4/6. 1967.
        After the traditional completion of some mural paintings in the 1930’s, he then arrived in Aubusson in 1936, became closely associated with Picart le Doux in 1947 and then joined the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie). From then on he devoted himself to tapestry with zeal and designed 167 cartoons, at first figurative following on from Picart le Doux and Saint-Saëns, then, influenced by the scientific themes that he dealt with, tending more towards abstraction. In 1981, two years before his death, he donated his studio to the Musée départemental de la tapisserie in Aubusson.   Rather than the purple colour, it is the sound of the name of the flower that was the effect desired by Jullien for the title of this piece. It is contemporaneous with another piece titled “Capucine” which was woven to the same dimensions.     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Hommage à Louis-Marie Jullien, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1983      
     
  • Matines (matins)

       
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. With signed label, n°5. Circa 1970.
      Henri Ilhe, who came to the design of tapestry cartoons late on in his career, still managed to produce from 1964 onwards a considerable number (more than 120, all woven by the Tabard workshop) in an urbane style, incorporating birds and butterflies sporting in and around the gnarled branches of trees and bushes.   The title of this piece evokes a certain community of spirit with Dom Robert in the mingling of  rural concerns and monastic  life.    
     
  • Hommage à Yukio Mishima (A tribute to Yukio Mishima)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Saint-Cyr workshop. With signed label, n°EA1. 1972.
       
    Jacques Brachet was an important protagonist of the « New Tapestry » movement ; woven by Pierre Daquin, exhibited by the « La Demeure » gallery in the 1970’s, his innovative and experimental approach to the medium,  from the 1950’s onwards, was recognised by the Centre International d’études pédagogiques in Sèvres, by the scenography of “La Tapisserie en France, 1945 – 1985, la tradition vivante” at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, and by his inclusion in various promotional events right up to the present day.   Brachet travelled to Japan in 1972. The specific techniques of his tapestry designs (as opposed to painting) : innovative use of shape and texture, themes taken from the natural world... would take off in new directions as a result. Paradoxically this particulat hommage to one of the most flamboyant and tragic figures of post-war Japan is, as a textile object, rather tame respecting the 2 dimensional norm, a classic wool weave... The brightly coloured motifs (dominated by a red disk-shaped sun) are in contrast with the white background, like a shard of light on the blade of the seppuku.   Bibliography : Madeleine Jarry, la tapisserie art du XXe siècle, Office du livre, 1974, ill. n°157
  • Jardin sauvage (wild garden)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Andraud workshop. With label, n°6/8. 1970.
        A student of Léon Detroy, Gaston Thiéry is one of the last representatives of the Crozant school of painting. Estalished in the Creuse region of France, he started working on tapestries in 1965 with the Andraud workshop for whom he designed cartoons inspired by the local flora, in a decorative style which can be situated somewhere between that of Dom Robert and Maingonnat, a world away from his landscape paintings which were strongly influenced by the impressionists.  
     
  • Technique de groupe (group technique)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Novion workshop. With label. 1973.
       
    A Benedictine monk and an illuminator, Dom Robert met Jean Lurçat in 1941 at the Abbey of En Calcat : while he never abandoned drawing (his watercolours, painted to life, would serve him as a reservoir of ideas for his tapestries), his work as a cartoonist (he was a member of the A.P.C.T. from its inception) would take on a considerable importance (at least a hundred cartoons, all numbered) and would be highly thought of.  His immediately recognisable style, absence of  perspective¸motifs inspired from the natural world (in a Paradisiac style) where stylised flora and fauna combine in a festive and extrovert exuberance, where the influence of mediaeval tapestry can be clearly felt ; poetic and colourful, Dom Robert’s cartoons are the incarnation of their author’s spiritual asceticism.   Inaugurated in the Spring of 2015, the musée Dom Robert opened its doors in in the monastery-school in Sorèze in the department of the Tarn.   Although the theme of horses runs through a lot of Dom Robert’s work (cf. “Dartmoor”, “Compagnons de la Marjolaine”, « Farfadet » …), what makes « Technique de groupe » particularly interesting is its origin and the technical aspects of its realisation : unusually, this cartoon is not numbered ; it was Novion, at the time a teacher at the Ecole Nationale d’Art Décoratif in Aubusson, who asked dom Robert to make a watercolour (now held at the museum in Sorèze), thus allowing the weaver more interpretative freedom, and a very different end result, from work made by the workshops of Goubely or Tabard.     Bibliography : Cat. Expo. Dom Robert, tapisseries récentes, Paris, Galerie la Demeure, 1974, ill. p.9 Multi-authored, Dom Robert, Tapisseries, Editions Julliard, 1980, ill. p.68-69 Multi-authored, Dom Robert, Tapisseries, Editions Siloë-Sodec, 1990, ill. p.116-117 Exhibition Catalogue, Dom Robert, œuvre tissé, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, 1990, ill. Multi-authored, la clef des champs, Dom Robert, Editions Privat, 2003, ill. p. 109
     
  • Tapis de sol (Floor carpet)

    Aubusson carpet/tapestry woven by the Goubely workshop. 1959.
        Manessier was trained in the Bissière studio where he became familiar with decorative art (the sets for the 1937 Exhibition), and with applied arts particularly in the context of religious art (cartoons for stained glass, the design of liturgical ornamentation,...), and designed his first tapestry cartoon in 1947. Somewhat disappointed with the results, too well-defined and arid for his taste, he turned in the 1950’s to the Plasse le Caisne workshop. Exploiting a different technique which allowed for the contrast of stitches, materials, the use of relief, ... and a greater freedom for the weaver who thus engaged in a close collaboration with the cartoon designer, Plasse le Caisne went on to weave most of Manessier’s tapestries, some of them particularly large-scale (“Chant Grégorien” for the Maison de la Radio,...), some of them forming a cycle (the 12 “Cantiques sprituels de Saint Jean de la Croix),...   Very much a one-off in Manessier’s work : a rug, but woven using the Aubusson weaving technique in the Goubely workshop (the only time they worked for the artist) ; it was a commission from Myriam Prévot, co-director of the Galerie de France, which was very active in the promotion of most of the non-figurative and lyrical abstract painters (organising 7 separate exhibitions devoted to Manessier), for her flat on the quai d’Anjou : underlying the close relationship between the artist and the gallery owner who represented him.   Bibliography : Exhibition Catalogue Manessier, oeuvre tissé, Eglise du château de Felletin, 1993 (ill. p.39)
  • Le feu (Fire)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Glaudin-Brivet workshop. With signed label, n°EX. 1945.
          Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design…) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology… refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate.   « Le Feu » is the 4th  in the series « les Quatre éléments », commissioned by Jansen, woven by Dumontet and exhibited in 1946 at the Musée d’Art Moderne. Myths and allegory were a frequent source of inspiration for the artist at this period : “Orion”, “Diane”, “Thésée et le Minotaure”  are all contemporary. Here the muscular figure of a Vulcanite blacksmith whose colour evokes glowing embers in dark relief against a flaming background leaves the observer with a  long-lasting impression.     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue La tapisserie française du Moyen-âge à nos jours, Paris, Musée d’art moderne, 1946 Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, Paris, galerie La Demeure, 1970, ill. Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, the tapestries, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapestries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1997-1998
  • La cueillette (Harvest)

    Tapestry. 1943.     Artiste polyvalent (graveur, médailleur, céramiste, fresquiste…), Savin est sollicité pendant la guerre  par Guillaume Janneau, qui admire la monumentalité intemporelle et réaliste de son esthétique (et dont il soupçonnait qu’elle n’aurait nul besoin de transposition pour convenir à la Tapisserie), pour concevoir des cartons pour les Manufactures Nationales : « les plaisirs et les travaux champêtres » ( 4 cartons), puis les « 12 mois de l’année » sont créés simultanément à son travail avec la Compagnie des Arts Français. L’influence des aspects techniques de la tapisserie médiévale est très prégnante chez l’artiste, attentif aux colorants naturels en gamme réduite, aux formes simples permises par la technique du gros point,… Il fut l’un des artistes les plus représentés à l’exposition séminale de 1946, avec 7 pièces (seuls Lurçat, Saint-Saëns et Gromaire en eurent plus).   « La cueillette » est contemporaine du carton conçu pour les Gobelins : « La cueillette des pommes », issue de la tenture sur « les plaisirs et travaux champêtres ». On y trouve les mêmes caractéristiques propres à l’artiste : gamme chromatique limitée mais vive, formes simplifiées et monumentales, densité de la composition, et une saveur rustique tout droit venue de la tapisserie médiévale.     Bibliographie : Cat. Expo. La tapisserie française du Moyen-âge à nos jours, Paris, Musée d’art moderne, 1946 Cat. Expo. Le Mobilier National et les Manufactures Nationales sous la IVe République, Beauvais, Galerie nationale de la Tapisserie, 1997 Cat. Expo. La Manufacture des Gobelins dans la 1ère moitié du XXe siècle, Beauvais, Galerie nationale de la Tapisserie, 1999
  • Figure de trois (Triplet)

    Tapestry woven by the Saint-Cyr workshop. With signed label, n°1/6. Circa 1970. An unknown artist, whose inspiration  finds its source in the instruments and theory of  Music ; a geometric evocation of a keyboard and the stave serve as a  framework for  the cartoon.
  • Concerto

    Tapestry woven by the Saint-Cyr workshop. With signed label, n°1/6. Circa 1970. An unknown artist, whose inspiration  finds its source in the instruments and theory of  Music ; a geometric evocation of a keyboard and the stave serve as a  framework for  the cartoon.
  • Poissons-voile (Fish-sail)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°5/6. 1969.
    Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons…), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département … In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars…), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds…), man, literary quotation … « Poissons-voile » reproduces the central motif of « Rouge de Chine » (Bruzeau n°178), from 1969, with its seaweed, coral and fish, one of this artist’s classic pieces. It is notable that Picart le Doux is probably the cartonnier who most often had recourse to red backgrounds of varying hues. Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Joufray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux Tapisseries, Musée municipal d’Art et d’Histoire, Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Epouvantail de lunes (Moon scarecrow)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pérathon workshop Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°1. Circa 1970. Better known for his machine woven panels reminiscent of the work of Picart le Doux, Hurtu also made a few rather more inspired cartoons which were hand woven.  
  • Univers végétal (Plant universe)

    Aubusson tapestry woven for Jansen. 1944.
       
    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. « Univers végétal » presents a paradox : there are more animals than plants pictured within. Thus already in 1944 Lurçat displays his penchant for framing the space within his compositions as with the cabinets and bestiaries : stuffed animals, as if in a cabinet of curiosities, are exhibited on shelves suspended on chains, hanging in starry skies in a poetic vision whose aim is to illustrate the unity of the natural world.   This design was woven in various formats, as can be seen in the 1946 exhibition  : a vertical rectangle, a square (2m x 2m, and also 3m x 3m) for Jansen, a Paris-based interior decorator, whose trade mark can be seen woven into this piece despite his not having a workshop in Aubusson (his commissions were woven by the Dumontet workshop).     Bibliography : Cat. Expo. La tapisserie française, Musée d’art moderne, Paris, 1946, n°278-279 Tapisseries de Jean Lurçat 1939-1957, Pierre Vorms Editeur, 1957, ill. n°31, 99 (details) Cat. Expo. Jean Lurçat, tapisseries de la fondation Rothmans, Musée de Metz, 1969, cat. n°6 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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016
  • Oiseau pilote (Pilot bird)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°1/6. 1969.
    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.” « Oiseau pilote » in the singular, like its path  « time-weaving » its way through a red sky (cf. “Oiseaux de Midi”, or “Envol” from the same year) forming a shape (or even a veritable dynamic!) showing the way and guiding us to follow... Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, 1989 Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1989 Exhibition Catalogue Tissages d’ateliers-tissages d’artistes, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 2004
     
     
  • Soleil (Sun)

    Tapestry woven by the Baudonnet workshop. N°1/6. Circa 1970.
    Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design...) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology... refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate. In the 1960’s, Saint-Saëns moved towards a more abstract style using bright, acidic and highly contrasted colours, and accentuated his attraction to the grand themes of Nature “the seasons”, “lightning”...) Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, galerie La Demeure, 1970 Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, the tapestries, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapestries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1997-1998
  • Rêve gris (Grey dream)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Glaudin-Brivet workshop. With signed label, n°6/6. Circa 1980.
    An unreferenced artist, Monique Brix  submitted a few tapestry cartoons to Aubusson which were woven by the Glaudin-Brivet or Pinton workshops.
  • Feu pour Law (Fire for Law)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pintron frères workshop. With signed certificate of origin, n°1/6. Circa 1970.
    Holger was a student at the Ecole Nationale d’Art Décoratif d’Aubusson and worked with Lurçat before the latter’s death in 1966. He designed numerous dream-like cartoons woven by the Aubusson workshop. Now settled in the United States, he remains a tireless advocate for, and witness to, modern tapestry design, organising exhibitions and lectures on the subject.
     
  • Chasse à courre (Riding to hounds)

    Tapestry woven in the Moulin de Vauboyen workshop. Circa 1970.
    A contemporary take on a traditional tapestry theme (for example Maximilien’s hunting scenes among others) with an autumnal colour scheme. Commere was one of the numerous figurative artists whose work was featured by the Moulin de Vauboyen and Pierre de Tartas.
  • Marchande de lait (Milkmaid)

    Tapestry woven in the Moulin de Vauboyen workshop. 1965.
    Foujita is one of a number of artists whose work was woven at Bièvres at the Moulin de Vauboyen (hence the mark MV woven into the tapestries), which was transformed by Pierre de Tartas into an arts centre in 1959 and devoted to figurative art. Many noteworthy names would pass through including Cocteau, Foujita, Erni, Volti … among others, who would produce much work, often monumental, as well as realisations in the applied arts (notably book illustrations) Foujita realised only a few tapestry cartoons, all of which were produced at Bièvres by Pierre de Tartas. This one (an original watercolour 147 x 157 cm) was sold on 8th December 2015 by Tajan, and another preparatory drawing appeared in the Kimiyo Foujita succession (Cornette de St Cyr, 28th October 2013, n°167c). Likenesses of children become (even more) common in the period post 2nd world war : all with the same physical type a large forehead, widely spaced eyes, thin nose, full lips and regularly represented in slightly archaic roles  redolent of Poulbot’s work.
     
  • Composition

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Andraud workshop. Circa 1960.
    Claude Bleynie discovered the art of tapestry with Jean Picart le Doux in 1952. He exhibited at the La Demeure gallery (from 1958) and participated in the main exhibitions devoted to mural art. His tapestry production counts more than 300 cartoons, mainly realised by the Andraud workshop. Bleynie, in a more abstract vein (which can also be found in his tapestries) notably designed cartoons for rugs which were intended for the luxurious appartment christened “Ile de France” on the ocean liner “France”. Bleynie, who also worked as a set designer in the theatre, designed numerous cartoons inspired by Dance and featuring animated masked and winged figures in fairy-like evocations.
     
  • Les petites algues (Small seaweed)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop Complete with certificate of origin. Circa 1950. Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons…), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département … In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars…), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds…), man, literary quotation … Seaweed (and more generally the underwater world) was a theme in Picart le Doux’s work throughout his career, from “les algues”  in 1946 onwards ; “Spiralgues”, “Buisson d’algues”, “les algues vertes”,... to name but a few. “Les petites algues” is a treatment, on a smaller scale, of the theme of “les algues” a cartoon 260 x 250 cm, edited by Leleu. The eponymous seaweed surround, lace-like, a central square where the real subject of the cartoon, a still-life arrangement of seashells and starfish, is framed. Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Joufray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux Tapisseries, Musée municipal d’Art et d’Histoire, Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980    
  • Adam et Eve

    Tapestry woven in the Moulin de Vauboyen workshop. 1967.
    Foujita is one of a number of artists whose work was woven at Bièvres at the Moulin de Vauboyen (hence the mark MV woven into the tapestries), which was transformed by Pierre de Tartas into an arts centre in 1959 and devoted to figurative art. Many noteworthy names would pass through including Cocteau, Foujita, Erni, Volti ... among others, who would produce much work, often monumental, as well as realisations in the applied arts (notably book illustrations) Foujita realised only a few tapestry cartoons, all of which were produced at Bièvres by Pierre de Tartas. In this particular case, unlike the rest of his production, his style is different from that of his paintings : almost monochrome, stylised (quite different from the lithe brushwork of the artist); as for the biblical theme, it can be seen as the result of his recent conversion to catholicism. Another tapestry, of similar dimensions and subject matter, but in a differing, lighter colour scheme, was also woven at Bièvres.
     
     
     
  • Tropiques (Tropics)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. Circa 1955.
    On returning to France in the 1950’s after a lengthy period spent in Argentina, Berroeta produced  quite a number of cartoons in a style which was first figurative (animals, human figures,...) then turned to abstraction, as in his paintings. The influence of cubism and a lyrical sense of colour cohabit here in a cartoon which could be seen as a reminiscence of South America.    
  • Les nymphéas (the waterlilies)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With label, n°6/6. 1968.  
    With a taste for the large-scale, influenced by Untersteller at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, Hilaire undertook numerous mural paintings. In the same vein, beginning in 1949, along with a number of other artists stimulated by Lurçat, (he would join the latter at the A.P.C.T. Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) he designed a number of cartoons some of which were woven at Beauvais or at Les Gobelins. Hilaire makes the subject, previously referenced by Monet, his own in his habitual, cubist (and tending towards the abstract) style, characterised by lines and  circular shapes in an exalted blue and green colour scheme. His early passion for horticulture, which was originally to be his profession, here echoes that of Monet in Giverny.   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Hilaire, œuvre tissé, galerie Verrière, 1970, ill. Exhibition catalogue, du trait à la lumière, Musée Départemental Georges de la Tour at Vic-sur-Seille, 2010.
     
  • Faiseur d'étoiles (Starmaker)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the André workshop. With signed label, n°3/3. 1957.
    After the traditional completion of some mural paintings in the 1930’s, he then arrived in Aubusson in 1936, became closely associated with Picart le Doux in 1947 and then joined the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie). From then on he devoted himself to tapestry with zeal and designed 167 cartoons, at first figurative following on from Picart le Doux and Saint-Saëns, then, influenced by the scientific themes that he dealt with, tending more towards abstraction. In 1981, two years before his death, he donated his studio to the Musée départemental de la tapisserie in Aubusson. Jullien’s interest in science and technology was evident early on in his career, at the end of the 1950’s, and this position singled him out somewhat among the other designers of the post-war period known in France as the “30 glorieuses”  (despite a few works by Matégot, Maurice André and particularly Millecamps).  Jullien imagined in 1961 an exhibition of his works entitled “Espace Poétique de l’Industrie” (Poetry in Industry) where he exhibited “Diamant noir” (the coal mine), Métropolis (oil refineries),  ..., and this piece “Faiseur d’étoiles”,  an allegory of autogenous welding. Bibliography : Exhibition Catalogue, Espace poétique de l'industrie, galerie La Demeure, 1961 (ill.) Exhibition catalogue Hommage à Louis-Marie Jullien, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1983
  • Le réviseur (the reviser)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Picaud workshop. With label, n°1/8. Circa 1980. Marc Petit met Jean Lurçat in 1954, went to Aubusson in 1955, exhibited his work for the first time at La Demeure in 1956, became a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) in 1958. After this lightning start to his career, he produced hundreds of cartoons, in a style all his own, where long-legged waders and acrobats wend in and out of dreamscapes.   An amusing design, which could be interpreted as the illustration of the antithesis of an author and his editor : here depicted by the curious association of a bird and a fish, in an extremely lively colour scheme.
     
  • Oiseaux de proie (Birds of prey)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Goubely workshop. With label, signed with stamp, and by the artit's son, n°6/6. 1941. Gromaire’s woven pieces are few in number : 11 cartoons, designed between 1938 and 1944, most of them in Aubusson. “His rigorous construction, his use of simplification, his penchant for grand composition and grand fundamental ideas, his knowledgeable use of colour and in sum his supreme quality as a master-craftsman, all of those things were to make of him one of the most expert tapestry artists of his time”, so wrote Jean Cassou (Exhibition catalogue, Marcel Gromaire, Paris, Musée Nationale d’art moderne, 1963). It was Guillaume Janneau, then in the chair of the Mobilier National, who contacted him in 1938, convinced that his style (simplification of shape, geometrical designs framed in black, influenced by cubism, limited colour schemes…) would have something to contribute to the resolution of the new aesthetic problems that the art of tapestry would have to confront in order to bring about its renewal (simplified palette, synthetic cartoon design...) firstly with a commission for a work on the theme of the four elements, then with a second (“les saisons”, the seasons) which would be produced at Aubusson. In 1940 Gromaire joined Lurçat and Dubreuil there. Working alone, with great  meticulosity (numerous drawings anticipate the cartoon which is painted rather than numbered as with Lurçat), in close collaboration with Suzanne Goubely, who would weave all his cartoons, he spent 4 years in Aubusson, during which time he devoted all his creative energy to tapestry. At the end of the war, he left the Creuse and produced no more cartoons, leaving to Lurçat the position of grand initiator of the tapestry renewal movement. « Oiseaux de proie » is one of the 5  tapestry cartoons designed by Gromaire for the Goubely workshop during the war and it is emblematic of his style : inspired by local landscapes, the absence of perspective, the strictly organised yet rich and highly abundant style, a limited palette (it is interesting to note the use at this period when France was occupied, the dominant colours of red, white and blue)... The atmosphere of this piece is more menacing than that of other pre-existing works.
    Bibliography : Le Point, Aubusson et la renaissance de la Tapisserie, mars 1946, ill. p.35 Jean Lurçat, Tapisserie française, Bordas, 1947, plate 25 J. Cassou, M. Damain, R. Moutard-Uldry, la tapisserie française et les peintres cartonniers, Tel, 1957 Exhibition catalogue, Gromaire, œuvre tissée, Aubusson, Musée de la tapisserie, 1995, reproduced on p. 49 Symposium Jean Lurçat et la renaissance de la tapisserie in Aubusson, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie 1992, ill. n°14 (detail) Exhibition catalogue La manufacture des Gobelins dans la première moitié du XXe siècle, Beauvais, Galerie nationale de la tapisserie, 1999.
     
  • Mirage

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With label. Circa 1965.
    Fumeron designed his first cartoons (he would ultimately make over 500) in the 1940’s, in collaboration with the Pinton workshop, he was then commissioned on numerous occasions by the state before participating in the decoration of the ocean liner “France”. His work was figurative to begin with and influenced by Lurçat, then turned towards abstraction, before coming back to a style characterised by colourful figurative and realistic depictions from the 1980’s onwards. This is a particularly interesting cartoon by Fumeron, one of his best in an abstract vein which puts him on an equal footing with Matégot.
     
     
  • Lumière du silence (Light of the silence)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. Complete with signed label, n°3/4. Circa 1970.  
    Originally a sculptor exploiting very diverse materials (steel, concrete, clay…), Borderie came to tapestry with immense enthusiasm in the 1950’s with the weaving of his first cartoon in 1957. Receiving encouragement from Denise Majorel, he was awarded the Grand Prix National de la Tapisserie in 1962. In 1974 he was appointed as director at the Ecole Nationale des Arts Décoratifs at Aubusson but he resigned from this post shortly thereafter. He designed over 500 painted cartoons, abstracts using simple shapes, shading in a limited palette of colours and weaving with gros points.   A dynamic abstraction with a limited colour scheme running from orange to brown, abstract motifs which play on the plastic effect of light passing through the colours : a classic cartoon from André Borderie.   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue André Borderie « pour l’homme simplement », Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1998 J.J. et B. Wattel, André Borderie et la tapisserie d'Aubusson, Editions Louvre Victoire, 2018
  • Waistcoat l'enfant aux mirages (child with mirages)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. 1997.
    Provenance : Sautour-Gaillard workshop
    A pupil of Wogensky at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Appliqués, Sautour-Gaillard had his first cartoon woven in 1971 by the Legoueix workshop (a collaboration which was to last), and from then on he designed many very large-scale projects of which the most spectacular was “Pour un certain idéal” a series of 17 tapestries dealing with the theme of Olympianism (property of the Musée de l’Olympisme in Lausanne). If at first close to lyrical abstraction, the artist produced in the 1990’s cartoons superimposing different decorative motifs, textures and figures whose unity originated in the woven texture itself. The 2 waistcoats from the exhibition « Archéologies » which was held at the Inard gallery in 1997, are  evidence  of the  wish expressed at the period by people from Aubusson, which was going through difficult times, to widen their activity : Sautour-Gaillard, who was himself an enthusiastic collector of fabrics, reveals here the same inspiration as in his contemporary woven collages. Bibliography : D. Cavelier, Jean-René Sautour-Gaillard, la déchirure, Lelivredart, 2013, ill. p.6, (worn by the artist) 296
     
  • La rivière d'argent (the silver river)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Hamot workshop to the artist’s cartoon. With certificate of origin signed by the artist. Circa 1960. 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. A classic cartoon in the naturalistic vein of this particular artist, who made a speciality of enclosures, hedges and riverbanks with animals.
  • Chili

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With signed label. Circa 1955.
    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. As is often the case, the title makes a reference to Latin America. As for the circular motif accompanying the owl, it is a classic as in, for example, “Forêt bleue”  or “La chouette des figuiers”,... 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, Meister der französischen Moderne, Halle, Kunsthalle, 2016 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016  
  • Linéaire (Linear)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. With signed label. 1974.
    Maurice André settled in Aubusson for the duration of the second world war. A founding member of the group “Tapisserie de France” and a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie), he developed a personal style, different from that of Lurçat, characterised by rigorous, cubist-influenced flat areas of colour, often using a limited palette ; he received large-scale public commissions for the Council of Europe in Strasbourg (“L’Europe unie dans le Travail et la Paix”) or for the French pavilion at the Brussels Exhibition in 1958 (“La Technique moderne au service de l’Homme”). Gradually (as with Wogensky and Prassinos,...) his style evolved towards more abstraction, firstly lyrical and then more and more geometric, in a way very similar to Matégot. Always geometric (going as far as pure abstraction in the 1970’s) Maurice André’s style is here limited to a cubic, kaleidoscopic vision : we can distinguish birds, roots, waves and perhaps a cage, …, all themes that can also be found in Lurçat’s work.
     
     
  • Le compotier (the fruit stand)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Braquenié workshop. Complete with signed label. 1956.
    Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ... A trellis background, reguarly found in Picart le Doux’s work in the 1950’s, notably in « Nature morte à la fontaine », woven at the Gobelins in 1952, is the expression of a certain decorative inclination to a style of tapestry popular in earlier times. “Le compotier” is a reworking of “les fruits et la guitare”, a larger work, woven at the Berthaut workshop in 1955. Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972, ill. n°64 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux Tapisseries, Musée municipal d’Art et d’Histoire, Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980    
  • Le Méridien étoilé (the starry meridian)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Berthaut workshop. circa 1948.
    Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons…), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département … In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars…), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds…), man, literary quotation … This cartoon is extracted from « Cosmogonie » (Bruzeau n°11), from 1948, here presented in a vertical format and without featuring the quotation from Goethe. The theme of the Astrolabe will be recurrent in his work, notably his eponymous tapestry of 1955. Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Jouffray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • La table de jardin (the table garden)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Hamot workshop. Editor’s certificate of origin, n° 4 of 6. Circa 1970.
    Odette Caly, who specialised in the depiction of bouquets, designed numerous cartoons for Aubusson, woven in the Pinton, Henry or Hamot workshops. Her inspiration, typically using meadow flowers, is here emphasised by the use of a border which refers back to the historical tapestry tradition. “La table du jardin” is reproduced in the “Tapisserie d’Aubusson” dossier edited by the Guéret Chamber of Commerce and Industry at the beginning of the 1980’s as evidence of the technical skill of the Aubusson workshops. Bibliography : Multi-authored, Caly, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1972, reproduit n°13
  • Solaire (solar )

    Aubusson tapestry woven in Pinton workshop. With a label signed by the artist, n°2/6. Circa 1970.
    Odette Caly, who specialised in the depiction of bouquets, designed numerous cartoons for Aubusson, woven in the Pinton, Henry or Hamot workshops. Her inspiration, rather rural usually, has oriented here towards more exotic flowers, highlighted by the green background. Bibliography : Multi-authored, Caly, Filmed Publications of Art and History, 1972, reproduced No. 24
  • Rendez-vous des oiseaux (the bird's meeting point)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Berthaut workshop. With label. 1951.
    Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ... Birds are a recurring motif of the artist in the first half of the 50s, as well as the flames punctuated by dots on the rim, one of Picart le Doux's signatures. Moreover, the limited chromatic range is reminiscent of traditional "verdures" tapestries. This tapestry is reproduced in Bruzeau's book, as No. 30. Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions cercle d'art, 1972
  • Le petit oiseleur (the little bird-catcher)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Picaud workshop. With label, n°1/6. Circa 1970.
    Elie Grekoff, whose aesthetic is similar to that of Lurçat, designed over 300 cartons.
    “The little bird catcher” is typical of a vein characteristic of Grekoff where melancholic children consider each other within a dream-like landscape against a background of large flat areas of colour, redolent of an illustration for a folk tale.
  • Concert champêtre (Outdoor concert)

    Needle-work tapestry. Circa 1965. « It is thus easy to understand that, having based my painting on my love of tapestry, it was relatively easy for me, and particularly tempting, to produce tapestries which were faithful to my painting” writes the artist in the exhibition catalogue for the 1970 show at the Galerie Verrière. It is not until 1961 that he started making designs (over 50) both for woven tapestries (at Aubusson, but also for the Mobilier National with, on occasion, the collaboration of Pierre Baudoin), but also those employing needlepoint. The artist’s very audacious palette is immediately recognisable in these cartons, with their use of primary colours or, as here, revolving around a very vivid pink with a rather dislocated storyline between the concert in the foreground and the hunting scene in the distance. Provenance : Elmina Auger collection Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue, Lapicque tapisseries, Paris, galerie Villand & Galanis, 1964-1965 Exhibition catalogue,  Lapicque, Lyons, Galerie Verrière 1970
  • Annick

    Tapestry woven by the Angers workshop. With label, n°1/6. 1968.
    Elie Grekoff, whose aesthetic is similar to that of Lurçat, designed over 300 cartons The motif of a sun radiating foliage is a classic with this artist ; it is possible that the title refers to a weaver at the Atelier de Tapisserie d’Angers (Angers Tapestry Workshop), which opened in the same year of 1968 and where Grekoff was the first painter-cartonnier to be produced.
  • Cadran solaire (Sundial)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. With signed label, n°6/6. Circa 1970.
    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,…) from whence he came. In order to express Nature’s harmony, Chaye includes in this characteristic scene of a river bank animated by flowers and animals, a sign of human presence, static and discreet : a sundial.  
  • L'étang (the pond)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in theTabard workshop. With label. Circa 1950.
    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. Fish in their natural habitat surrounded by foliage in a characteristically profuse style. An owl, also a habitual character, looks on. 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, 2016
       
  • Petite harpe des bois (little harp of the woods)

    Tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist's widow, n°3/6. Circa 1975. Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ... This cartoon refers back to « la harpe des forêts”, the sylvan harp, of 1953 (Bruzeau n°45). The  link between music and nature is a leitmotiv in the work of Picart le Doux : these tapestries are often animated by birds outlined agains the vertical background of the strings. Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux Tapisseries, Musée municipal d’Art et d’Histoire, Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980 Exhibition Catalogue le salon de musique, église du château, Felletin, 2002, ill. p.54
  • La Lyre (The lyre)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. Circa 1960. Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ... The image of the lyre, and also that of the harp, is one of the leitmotivs of the artist. Representative of Apollo, the lyre regularly appears with the sun (cf for example “Soleil-lyre”; Bruzeau n°82), but also as a symbol of the passing of time (similar to the use of the pendulum in the XVIIIth century, interestingly one of the artist’s cartoons is titled “the Pendulum”,  auction in Lille 17.06.01 n°464) : “les Phases du temps” (the phases of time, cf Armelle Bouchet Mazas, le paquebot France, Editions Norma, 2006, p.72) which adorned the 1st class smoking room on the France. Strangely enough, our tapestry does not figure in Bruzeau’s book : possibly because it was specially commissioned for a scientific or industrial organisation, if one considers the form which appears with the lyre. Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d'art, 1972 Armelle Bouchet Mazas, le paquebot France, Editions Norma, 2006
  • Kosmische Vision (Cosmic vision)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pintron frères workshop. With certificate of origin. Circa 1970.
    Holger was a student at the Ecole Nationale d’Art Décoratif d’Aubusson and worked with Lurçat before the latter’s death in 1966. He designed numerous dream-like cartoons woven by the Aubusson workshop. Now settled in the United States, he remains a tireless advocate for, and witness to, modern tapestry design, organising exhibitions and lectures on the subject.
  • Les blés (Wheats)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Picaud workshop. Complete with signed label, n° EA. Circa 1960.
    Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ... The blaze of sunlight, as also the spears of wheat, refer back to the Summer : both « Soleil d’août”, from 1958 (Bruzeau n°85) and “l’Or”  from 1962 (Bruzeau n°126) use these motifs, but on a larger scale. Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux Tapisseries, Musée municipal d’Art et d’Histoire, Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980  
  • Belzébuth

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Goubely workshop. With label. Circa 1950.
    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 Tapiisserie) 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. Beelzebub is a demon : the billy goat in Lurçat’s personal bestiary represents evil, the demonic force often associated with and couterbalanced by the cock. But it is also a living force incrusted, as here, in vegetation and the natural world. All the artist’s particular iconography is here in these goats, cocks and lizards. Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Jean Lurçat, Tapisseries nouvelles, Maison de la pensée Française, 1956 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 Jean Lurçat, Donation Simone Lurçat, Académie des Beaux-Arts, 2004 Jean Lurçat, le chant du monde Angers 2007.
  • Composition

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tapisseries de France workshop. Circa 1960.
    Maurice André settled in Aubusson for the duration of the second world war. A founding member of the group “Tapisserie de France” and a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie), he developed a personal style, different from that of Lurçat, characterised by rigorous, cubist-influenced flat areas of colour, often using a limited palette ; he received large-scale public commissions for the Council of Europe in Strasbourg (“L’Europe unie dans le Travail et la Paix”) or for the French pavilion at the Brussels Exhibition in 1958 (“La Technique moderne au service de l’Homme”). Gradually (as with Wogensky and Prassinos,...) his style evolved towards more abstraction, firstly lyrical and then more and more geometric, in a way very similar to Matégot. Always geometric (going as far as pure abstraction in the 1970’s) Maurice André’s style is here limited to a cubic, kaleidoscopic vision : we can distinguish birds, roots, waves and perhaps a cage, …, all themes that can also be found in Lurçat’s work.
  • Composition

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. N°1/6. Circa 1960.
    Fumeron designed his first cartoons (he would ultimately make over 500) in the 1940’s, in collaboration with the Pinton workshop, he was then commissioned on numerous occasions by the state before participating in the decoration of the ocean liner “France”. His work was figurative to begin with and influenced by Lurçat, then turned towards abstraction, before coming back to a style characterised by colourful figurative and realistic depictions from the 1980’s onwards. An abstract cartoon, typical of the artist’s work, in a style which are redolent of Borderie or Wogensky, and which bear witness to the unceasing originality of his creativity.
  • Composition

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. Circa 1960.
    Born in 1912, Farvèze is one of the second generation of painter-cartonniers whose heyday dates from the end of the 1950’s, with the likes of Grékoff, Ferréol, Petit, Potin, … Influenced both by his meeting with Gleizes and a trip to Senegal which brought prestigious state commissions, he would be chosen to participate in the second Biennale de Lausanne in 1965. This piece is characterised by a highly stylised and very colourful design ; the absence of the certificate of origin means that we have no indication of the title or subject  - although various animal-shaped forms can be distinguished.
  • Le veilleur (the watchman)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. With label. 1948.
    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.” Symptomatic of the heroic period at the end of the 1940’s, which also saw the blossoming of such talents as Tourlière, Lagrange, Matégot,..., all of whom were still young, inspired by Lurçat, and at the same time trying to assert their independent styles, whilst still remaining figurative, “le veilleur” affirms in a lyrical and brightly coloured style, its proximity to daily life (viz the detail of the striped jacket), and, at the same time, a highly symbolic connotation : a figure on the look-out in uncertain times. Bibliography : J. Cassou, M. Damain, R. Moutard-Uldry, la tapisserie française et les peintres cartonniers, Tel, 1957, ill. p.131 Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, 1989, ill. p.15 Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1989 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat, compagnons de route et passants considérables, Felletin, Eglise, 1992, ill. p.46
  • Allégorie des métiers (Allegory of trades)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Braquenié workshop. 1958.
    A curious cartoon where, against a vaguely hexagonal (reference to France, often referred to as “l’hexagone”) star-shaped background are pictured the family, traditional trades (fisherman, farmer,...) placed in front of  gasometres, cranes and other emblems of modernity : a hymn to reconstruction, a political allegory, a work of propaganda,...  ?
  • Vercors

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With signed label, n°2/6. Circa 1965.  
    Maurice André settled in Aubusson for the duration of the second world war. A founding member of the group “Tapisserie de France” and a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie), he developed a personal style, different from that of Lurçat, characterised by rigorous, cubist-influenced flat areas of colour, often using a limited palette ; he received large-scale public commissions for the Council of Europe in Strasbourg (“L’Europe unie dans le Travail et la Paix”) or for the French pavilion at the Brussels Exhibition in 1958 (“La Technique moderne au service de l’Homme”). Gradually (as with Wogensky and Prassinos,...) his style evolved towards more abstraction, firstly lyrical and then more and more geometric, in a way very similar to Matégot.   In the mid 1960’s André’s style becomes comparable to that of Matégot, where battage, pick and pick and shading are the norm. Varying shades of green and triangular shapes are the means of evoking the peaks of the Vercors.
  • L’arbre de vie (Life tree)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in theTabard workshop. With signed label, n°5/8. Circa 1970.
     
    Henri Ilhe, who came to the design of tapestry cartoons late on in his career, still managed to produce from 1964 onwards a considerable number (more than 120, all woven by the Tabard workshop) in an urbane style, incorporating birds and butterflies sporting in and around the gnarled branches of trees and bushes. Should this be taken as an interpretation of the tree of life as a symbol of Creation as mentioned in various religious traditions, or more simply as an allegory for Nature with its budding leaves irrigated by a meandering stream ?
  • Flore des Baronnies (Baronnies's Flora)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Andraud workshop. With label, n°1/6. 1974.
     
    A student of Léon Detroy, Gaston Thiéry is one of the last representatives of the Crozant school of painting.   Established in the Creuse region of France, he started working on tapestries in 1965 with the Andraud workshop for whom he designed cartoons inspired by the local flora, in a decorative style which can be situated somewhere between that of Dom Robert and Maingonnat, a world away from his landscape paintings which were strongly influenced by the impressionists.
  • Les Jumelles (the twins)

     
    Tapestry woven in the Moulin de Vauboyen workshop. With signed label, n°3/8. 1966.
     
    Carzou is one of a number of artists whose work was woven at Bièvres at the Moulin de Vauboyen (hence the mark MV woven into the tapestries), which was transformed by Pierre de Tartas into an arts centre in 1959 and devoted to figurative art. Many noteworthy names would pass through including Cocteau, Foujita, Erni, Volti ... among others, who would produce much work, often monumental, as well as realisations in the applied arts (notably book illustrations)   Carzou was most noted at the start of his career as a decorative painter (notably for the theatre), and his work for tapestry is relatively rare. His style is immediately recognisable in this cartoon, the busy hatching illustrating dream-like subjects, not unlike work produced by Lucien Coutaud.
  • Couple génétique (Genetic couple)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With label. 1976.
      In this work – which is apparently the only cartoon by this artist – the deft line and clear drawing technique of Trémois are immediately recognisable. He is best known for his work as an engraver and illustrator, albeit having won the Grand Prix de Rome for his painting. Also evident, his predilection for the nude : here a loving embrace and a meditation on modern science are found in association in a surprising, and very personal, juxtaposition.
  • Eaux vives (Wild water)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. Complete with signed label, n°1/6. Circa 1970.
      Originally a sculptor exploiting very diverse materials (steel, concrete, clay…), Borderie came to tapestry with immense enthusiasm in the 1950’s with the weaving of his first cartoon in 1957. Receiving encouragement from Denise Majorel, he was awarded the Grand Prix National de la Tapisserie in 1962. In 1974 he was appointed as director at the Ecole Nationale des Arts Décoratifs at Aubusson but he resigned from this post shortly thereafter. He designed over 500 painted cartoons, abstracts using simple shapes, shading in a limited palette of colours and weaving with gros points.   Despite its warm colours and lyrical shapes (notably the sinuous vertical swirl, ressembling water currents), “Eaux vives” remains a one-off in Borderie’s work : the habitual muted colour scheme is broken here by the striking central red oval.     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue André Borderie « pour l’homme simplement », Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1998 J.J. et B. Wattel, André Borderie et la tapisserie d'Aubusson, Editions Louvre Victoire, 2018
  • L’enclos (Enclosure)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Brivet workshop. With signed label, n°4/4. 1966.
     
    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,...) from whence he came.   Here is a thoroughly characteristic cartoon of this artist who specialises in pastures, hedges and woodland scenes.
  • Cuivres (Copper-coloured)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With signed label. Circa 1950.

      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.   Copper-coloured is used to describe certain butterflies whose wings recall this brightly coloured metal. This cartoon is a re-take on  “Sphinx and Cockerel”  (but without the cockerel) in a highly decorative positive/negative contrast of yellow against a black background.   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, 2016
  • Composition

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. N°1/6. Circa 1970.  
    Maurice André settled in Aubusson for the duration of the second world war. A founding member of the group “Tapisserie de France” and a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie), he developed a personal style, different from that of Lurçat, characterised by rigorous, cubist-influenced flat areas of colour, often using a limited palette ; he received large-scale public commissions for the Council of Europe in Strasbourg (“L’Europe unie dans le Travail et la Paix”) or for the French pavilion at the Brussels Exhibition in 1958 (“La Technique moderne au service de l’Homme”). Gradually (as with Wogensky and Prassinos,...) his style evolved towards more abstraction, firstly lyrical and then more and more geometric, in a way very similar to Matégot.   Characteristic of André’s final period, the geometric shapes and flat areas of colour are tempered by hatching, stripes and shading.
  • Faisan feu (Pheasant Fire)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. With signed label. Circa 1960.
        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.   This profile of the head of a cockerel appears in various cartoons (« Feux bleus », « la chanson de Roland »,…) : it appears, with its almond-shaped halo, as if in reserve, shining brightly against the black background. The title of this piece allows a play on words with the French “faire feu” an expression meaning to shoot.   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, 2016
  • Le paon (the peacock)

     
    Tapestry woven by the Baudonnet workshop. With label. 1959.  
    Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design…) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology… refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate.   The number and variety of animals used in his tapestries by Saint-Saëns is not so rich as others of his contemporaries such as Lurçat, Perrot or Dom Robert, principally known for his peacocks. Here the use, as if off the ground, of a similar motif (despite the fact that it more ressembles a cockerel than a peacock) illustrates the variety of solutions employed by the painter-cartonniers of the period.       Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, galerie La Demeure, 1970 Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, the tapestries, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapestries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1997-1998
  • Nappe blanche (White tablecloth)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Goubely workshop. Circa 1955.  
    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 Tapiisserie) 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.   The theme of the laid table is a leitmotiv in Lurçat’s work as early as the 1940’s (cf The four corners, 1943 Goubely-Gatien workshop, Angers Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine). These tables, often with connotations of the horn of plenty and often featuring musical instruments (most often the mandolin) recall the traditional still life’s of the XVIIth century, not, as it happens, a theme of contemporary tapestry.   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, 2016
  • Hommage à Mozart (Homage to Mozart)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Hamot workshop. N° EA. 1955.
      Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   Cartoons devoted to musical themes are extremely frequent in Picart le Doux’s work : forms (here the concerto), specific works (“La petite musique de nuit”, a little night music, another title for our work ; “Les 4 saisons”, the 4 seasons, for example) composers (“Hommage à Vivaldi”, “Hommage à Bach”, which was reproduced as a stamp in 1980), instruments (“Soleil-Lyre”, Sun-lyre, “Harpe des mers”, Ocean harp), mythological figures (“Orphée”, Orpheus).In most cases these thematic motifs are integrated into a bucolic natural scene animated by birds and butterflies in a decorative style typical of the artist.   Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Jouffray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966, ill. n°5 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972, ill. n°159 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Hibou (Owl)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. 1955.
    Perrot began his career as a cartoon designer at the end of the war, making almost 500 cartoons including numerous commissions from the state, most of which were woven at Aubusson. His style which is particularly rich and decorative is eminently recognisable : a crowd of butterflies or birds, most often, stands out against a background of vegetation, reminiscent of the millefleurs tapestries (which would also inspire Dom Robert).   This tapestry is a typical example of the artist’s portraits of birds ; the owl appears, as often in his work, associated with other birds, against a background inspired by the flower-strewn mediaeval tapestries.   Bibliography : Tapisseries, dessins, peintures, gravures de René Perrot, Dessein et Tolra, 1982
     
      .  
  • La souche (the stump)

     
    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With label. Circa 1960.  
    Fumeron designed his first cartoons (he would ultimately make over 500) in the 1940’s, in collaboration with the Pinton workshop, he was then commissioned on numerous occasions by the state before participating in the decoration of the ocean liner “France”. His work was figurative to begin with and influenced by Lurçat, then turned towards abstraction, before coming back to a style characterised by colourful figurative and realistic depictions from the 1980’s onwards.   Strangely enough, despite the naturalistic title, the cartoon leans towards abstraction in a kind of refinement of Fumeron’s figurative cartoons where we can still recognise the circular yellow-sun characteristic of the artist.
  • Le chant du matin (morning song)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. N°5/6. 1965.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   An amusing allegory of a cock-harp, luminescent and joyous : if the title and the motif itself are reminiscent of  the work of Jean Lurçat, the particularly decorative character of this piece is typical of Picart le Doux.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972, ill. n°147 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Violoncelle (cello)

      Tapestry perhaps woven by the Dumontet workshop. 1947.     Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design...) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology... refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate.   Once more a cartoon which takes music as its theme, a leitmotiv for this artist. Amusingly, and in stark contrast to the importance Saint-Saëns gives to the human figure in his work, the title evokes the instrument rather than the instrumentalist .   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, galerie La Demeure, 1970 Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, the tapestries, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapestries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1997-1998
  • Paysage à la huppe (Landscape with hoopooe)

          Aubusson tapestry woven by the Goubely workshop. Compete with label. 1941.   Gromaire’s woven pieces are few in number : 11 cartoons, designed between 1938 and 1944, most of them in Aubusson. “His rigorous construction, his use of simplification, his penchant for grand composition and grand fundamental ideas, his knowledgeable use of colour and in sum his supreme quality as a master-craftsman, all of those things were to make of him one of the most expert tapestry artists of his time”, so wrote Jean Cassou (Exhibition catalogue, Marcel Gromaire, Paris, Musée Nationale d’art moderne, 1963). It was Guillaume Janneau, then in the chair of the Mobilier National, who contacted him in 1938, convinced that his style (simplification of shape, geometrical designs framed in black, influenced by cubism, limited colour schemes…) would have something to contribute to the resolution of the new aesthetic problems that the art of tapestry would have to confront in order to bring about its renewal (simplified palette, synthetic cartoon design...) firstly with a commission for a work on the theme of the four elements, then with a second (“les saisons”, the seasons) which would be produced at Aubusson. In 1940 Gromaire joined Lurçat and Dubrueil there. Working alone, with great  meticulosity (numerous drawings anticipate the cartoon which is painted rather than numbered as with Lurçat), in close collaboration with Suzanne Goubely, who would weave all his cartoons, he spent 4 years in Aubusson, during which time he devoted all his creative energy to tapestry. At the end of the war, he left the Creuse and produced no more cartoons, leaving to Lurçat the position of grand initiator of the tapestry renewal movement. « Paysage à la huppe » is one of 5 cartoons designed by Gromaire for the Goubely workshop, and it is absolutely emblematic of his style : inspired by local landscapes, a flattened perspective, a densely decorative style (the hoopoe seems to merge into the landscape), rigorously organised with a restricted colour scheme... This tapestry was shown at the exhibition “La tapisserie française du Moyen Age à nos jours” which was held at the Museum of Modern Art in 1946.     Bibliography : Le Point, Aubusson et la renaissance de la Tapisserie, mars 1946, ill. p.37 (detail) Jean Lurçat, Tapisserie française, Bordas, 1947, plate 25 J. Cassou, M. Damain, R. Moutard-Uldry, la tapisserie française et les peintres cartonniers, Tel, 1957, illustrated p.61 Exhibition catalogue, Gromaire, œuvre tissée, Aubusson, Musée de la tapisserie, 1995, reproduced on p 55 Exhibition catalogue La manufacture des Gobelins dans la première moitié du XXe siècle, Beauvais, Galerie nationale de la tapisserie, 1999.
  • L'Homme et la Terre (Man and the Earth)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Hamot workshop. 1962.   Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   At the turn of the 1960’s Picart le Doux conceived a series of large-scale cartoons (« Le Temps » Galaxie », « L’Homme et la Mer », …) all of which were spectacular allegories centred around Man at the centre of Creation. Here in “L’Homme et la Terre”, the vocabulary he uses : vines, ears of wheat, the human body irrigated by veins,...are all elements used in previous cartoons by the same artist.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972, ill. n°132 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Composition

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. With label, n°1/1. 1974.   Jean Bazaine, like many of his contemporaries, was a prolific mural artist particularly for large scale edifices. Although he is above all recognised as a designer of stained glass windows and mosaics, he was also making tapestry cartoons as early as the 1930’s. These pieces formed part of the renewal of religious art of which Bazaine would be one of the principal protagonists, particularly after the war.   However, Bazaine’s designs are not all destined to be displayed in a religious context. His mastery of mural art is revealed by commissions for mosaics for the UNESCO building and also for the Maison de la Radio as well as tapestries for the Manufactures Nationales or for Aubusson, for the Palais de Justice in Lille or the Hotel de Ville in Strasbourg. This is the context for a commission for this widely recognised,  indeed almost official, artist (Grand Prix National des Arts in 1964, an exhibition at the Musée National d’Art Moderne in 1965) from the Federation Française du Bâtiment for its head office, at the beginning of the 1970’s. His response would be this vast, lyrical and rythmic composition in a homogeneous colour scheme. Unfortunately, the illegibility of the certificate of origin leaves us without a title for this work whose creator did not see himself as an abstract artist.   Origin : The Head Office of the Federation Francaise du Bâtiment.
  • Sphinx gris (grey hawk moth)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the  Braquenié workshop. With signed label. Circa 1955.     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.   The grey hawk moth (or occasionally yellow, in another cartoon), moths and butterflies are a leitmotiv in Lurçat’s work. Here the colours are less contrasted than is his wont, in a highly nuanced composition.   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, 2016
  • Le basset (Basset hound)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tabard worshop. Complete with label. Circa 1950.     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.   Something of a dog lover, Lurçat owned Afghan hounds. They can be found occasionally in his cartoons and seemingly Lurçat found it difficult not to be influenced by their aspect : his basset hound (similar in style to another cartoon entitled “le chien vert” the green dog, but without the owl) scarcely merits its name.   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, 2016
  • Feux du soir (Evening sparkles)

          Aubusson tapestry woven in the Simone André workshop. Complete with signed label. Circa 1970.     Edmond Dubrunfaut can be considered as the great 20th century renovator of the Belgian tapestry tradition. He founded a weavers’ workshop in Tournai as early as 1942, then, in 1947, created the Centre de Rénovation de la Tapisserie de Tournai. He produced for various Belgian workshops (Chaudoir, de Wit,...) numerous cartoons destined notably to adorn Belgian embassies throughout the world. Moreover, Dubrunfaut was a teacher of monumental art forms at the Academie des Beaux-Arts de Mons from 1947 to 1978 and then, in 1979, contributed to the creation of the Fondation de la tapisserie, des arts du tissu et des arts muraux de Tournai, a veritable heritage centre for the art of the tapestry in Wallonie. His style, characterised by figuration, strong colour contrasts, draws direct inspiration from nature and animal life (as with Perrot, for example, this artist has a net predilection for birdlife).   Between a sunflower (a recurrent flower in Dubrunfaut’s work) and hazlenuts, scorning any reference to scale, the squirrels go about their business of procuring food : from this humdrum task, Dubrunfaut produces, by way of his title, a poetic effect in a dreamlike style.
  • Argos

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Picaud workshop. Complete with signed certificate of origin, n° 1/4. 1971.     Loewer designed his first cartoon in 1953 ; his early works are first figurative before turning to abstraction (like Matégot) which is exclusively geometric in Loewer’s case. He designed over 180 cartoons, most of which were woven by his friend, Raymond Picaud.   Around 1971-1972, Loewer’s style became more refined, with fewer geometric squares and a brighter, more contrasted use of colour. As is often the case with Loewer, this is a one-off piece. Bibliography : Claude Loewer, l’évasion calculée : travaux de 1939 à 1993, catalogue raisonné des tapisseries de 1953 à 1974, Sylvio Acatos, Charlotte Hug, Walter Tschopp and Marc-Olivier Wahler, Artcatos, 1994, n°128
  • Sphère et colombes (Sphere and doves)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Berthaut workshop. Complete with signed label. Circa 1954.   Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   Typical of the associations that characterise his work, Picart le Doux here confronts Nature (organised in a formal French garden style) peopled by doves with 3 allegories : literature (a book) the arts (a mandoline), science (a sphere) : the incarnation of a classical mind.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Musique et coquillage  (music and shell)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Tabard workshop. Complete with label. Circa 1950.   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.   This piece (of which a copy is exhibited at the Cité de la Tapisserie in Aubusson) is a typical example of the laden table, recurrent in Lurçat’s work. The juxtaposition of a musical instrument and shellfish is a direct reference to the work of Picart le Doux. 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 R. Guinot, la tapisserie d’Aubusson et de Felletin, Lucien Souny, 2009, ill. p.96 Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016
  • Petit bois (grove)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. With label, signed by the artist. Circa 1970.     Henri Ilhe, who came to the design of tapestry cartoons late on in his career, still managed to produce from 1964 onwards a considerable number (more than 120, all woven by the Tabard workshop) in an urbane style, incorporating birds and butterflies sporting in and around the gnarled branches of trees and bushes. “Petit bois” is thus, characteristic of Ilhe’s bucolic inspiration.
  • Houle de fond de l'été (summer undertow)

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. 1958.   Both a witness and a protagonist in the evolution of modern art on the Côte d’azur immediately after the war, André Verdet devoted himself equally to poetry, painting and pottery,.... but also to tapestry as can be seen in the thirty odd cartoons which were woven by Tabard from the end of the 50’s until the middle of the 1970’s. The undertow is here like a stylised bird (and reminiscent of Braque) whose habitat is the black waves, above which hangs the sun, but also clouds, perhaps heralding a storm.
  • La harpe des forêts (harp of the forests)

      Tapestry woven in the Berthaut workshop. Complete with certificate of origin. 1953.   Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   The tree/ harp is recurrent with Picart le Doux (occasionally one can find also a tree/ lyre, Bruzeau n° 44) reflecting his sensitivity to the inter-penetration of Nature and Music, and also to the decorative interest of multicoloured string-stripes, here set against a green, humus-scented background.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972, ill. n°45 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Le réveille-matin (the alarm clock)

      Tapestry woven in the Baudonnet workshop. Complete with signed label. 1959.   Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design...) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology... refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate.   “Saint-Saens who produced a series of birds in 1949 only rarely represented the cock, a recurrent subject for Lurçat. In this piece the cock has no symbolic value but merely announces with gales of crowing and colour the arrival of the new day.” (Exhibition Catalogue Sain-Saëns, œuvre  tissé, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987 p.48)   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, galerie La Demeure, 1970 Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, the tapestries, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987, ill. p.49 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapestries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1997-1998
  • Ô soleil  (O Sun)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Hamot workshop. With signed label, n°2/8. 1968.   Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   « The inclusion of text constitutes a closer means of communication with the poet” says Picart le Doux (a process used also by Lurçat) who will quote Apollinaire as here (“la jolie rousse”) but also Whitman, Eluard, Saint John Perse,... Illustrated by an ardent heart and, in a literal reflection of the text, by the sun, he associates the zodiac, one of his recurrent motifs, with the love poem.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972, ill. n°161 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Dragon dans la nuit (a dragon in the night)

          Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°1/6. Circa 1965.     Matégot, originally a decorator, then creator of artefacts and furniture (an activity he abandoned in 1959) met François Tabard in 1945 and gave him his first cartoons, first of all figurative then rapidly of abstract design in the 1950’s. He became a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres Cartonniers de Tapisserie) in 1949, participated in many international exhibitions (Matégot, like Lurçat before him, was an untiring advocate of the art of tapestry) fulfilled numerous public commissions, sometimes of monumental proportions (“Rouen” 85m2 for the Préfecture of the Seine Maritime département, and also tapestries for Orly Airport, for the Maison de la Radio, for the IMF...) and designed no fewer than 629 cartoons up until the 1970’s. In 1990 the Matégot foundation for contemporary tapestry was inaugurated in Bethesda, U.S.A. Matégot is an artist, like Wogensky, Tourlière or Prassinos, who turns wool textiles resolutely towards the abstract: at first lyrical, geometric in the 70’s, exploiting various technical aspects of the loom : colour graduations, shading, irregularities...     The cartoon is characterised by the habitual contrast of light and shadow, typical of those of this period ; the title, however, conveys a more figurative context, evoking a fantastic beast breathing flames (and indeed illustrated in fire) to disperse the darkness.   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue, Matégot, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1990-1991 Patrick Favardin, Mathieu Matégot, Editions Norma, 2014
  • Les oiseaux s'envolent (birds fly)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Berthaut workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist. 1949.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons…), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département … In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars…), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds…), man, literary quotation …   “Les oiseaux s’envolent” (the flight of the birds)  was intended as a symbolic representation of the Liberation of France, a theme which recurrs in the “la cage ouverte’ (the open cage) in 1953.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
     
  • Le luth et les colombes (the lute and the doves)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Berthaut workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°6/8. Circa 1955.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   The lute and the doves is a reworking of a larger and more densely decorated cartoon dating from 1949 and titled “les oiseaux s’envolent” (the flight of the birds) which was intended as a symbolic representation of the Liberation of France, a theme which recurrs in the “la cage ouverte’ (the open cage) in 1953.   Bibliography : Marthe Belle-Jouffray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966, ill. n°3 Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Vega

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. Certificate of origin signed by the artist n° 2 of 4. 1967.   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.”   « Vega » is a work inspired by Wogensky’s « cosmic » vein (it’s title alone bears witness to the fact) which lasted through the 1960’s and of which “Cosmos” (1968 Strasbourg University) and “Galaxy” (1970, Sénat Palais du Luxembourg) would be the high points. Shading (omnipresent) and blocks of colour co-exist in a subtle harmony, evoking a curious, unknown world with elements of the infinitely small as seen through a microscope and the infinitely large.   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, 1989 Exhibition catalogue Robert Wogensky, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1989
  • Concert des oiseaux (concert of birds)

        Tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°4/6. Circa 1975.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   Music as a theme is frequently associated with birds in Picart le Doux’s work ; this particular cartoon is an extension of the « harpe des forêts” tapestry dating from 1953.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • le tiercelet (the sparrow hawk)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist's beneficiary, n° E.A.1 1942.       Elie Maingonnat governed the Ecole Nationale des Arts Décoratifs d’Aubusson from 1930 until 1958 where he took over from Marium Martin (who already recommended the use of a limited number of colours and the use of hachures, a similar technique to hatching) of whom he was a pupil. As well as assuming the responsibilities of his position, Maingonnat devoted himself to designing cartoons : motifs of dense vegetation animated by the presence of a few animals, both of which were inspired by the flora and fauna of the Limousin area of France revitalising the traditional theme of greenery used in the XVIIth and XVIIIth centuries.   This cartoon is typical of Maingonnat’s work : local flora and fauna (here a diminutive sparrow hawk among  gentians on the bank of a mountain stream) are illustrated in a limited grey-green spectrum which is reflected and emphasised by the browns of the stones in the river.   Bibliographie : Exhibition Catalogue Elie Maingonnat, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie, 1986-1987, Ill.
  • Etoiles de neige (Snow Flakes)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Berthaut workshop. N°7/8. 1962.   Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   The theme of winter is chracterised in Picart le Doux’s work by the use of  templates, colours (muted tones, browns, black, white), and motifs (bare branches, kaleidoscopic flake shapes) ; the snow flakes referred to here will also be used in “Solstice d’hiver” and “Hommage à Vivaldi”.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972, ill. n°122 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Le phénix (the phoenix)

          Aubusson tapestry woven in the Hamot workshop. Complete with label signed by the artist, n°EA. 1965.   Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his inspiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   « Le Phénix » (The Phoenix) (An identical lithograph exists also), a subject inspired by legend (a rare event in the work of Picard le Doux) reproduces a chromatic harmony of yellow motifs against a red background typical of this particular artist.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972, ill. n°162 Exhibition Catalogue, Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Musée de Saint-Denis, 1976 Exhibition Catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Adam et Eve

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Robert Four workshop. With label, n°EA 1/2. Circa 1990.     A specialist in the painting of murals, particularly on volcanic stone, Francesca Guerrier, whose style can be described as figurative influenced by cubism, concentrated mainly on the human figure and produced much art of religious inspiration.   The picture from which this tapestry is produced is reproduced on the cover of a book “Peintures bibliques de Francesca Guerrier”, éditions du cerf, 1998.
  • Poissons et grenouilles (fish and frogs)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Picaud workshop. Complete with signed label, n°1/4. Circa 1970.  

          Elie Grekoff, whose aesthetic is similar to that of Lurçat, designed over 300 cartons : a black background evokes an underwater world where fish and leaves are pictured with the amusing and un-Lurçat-like presence of frogs.
  • Soleils éteints (Extinct suns)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°1/6. Circa 1970.   Originally an engraver (Prix de Rome, intaglio technique in 1942), Jean-Louis Viard designed his first tapestry cartoons in the mid 1950’s. At first his work was figurative (he was collaborating at the time with Picart Le Doux), but then he evolved along the same lines as many other painter-cartoonists of the period (Matégot, Tourlière or Prassinos,...) towards abstraction. He produced scores of cartoons working up until the 2000’s, in parallel to his work as a painter and engraver, but throughout revealing a particular interest for the use of contrasting materials and textures in the tradition of the “Nouvelle Tapisserie” of which Pierre Daquin was one of the leading lights.   The inspiration for his motifs, sometimes metaphysical (“Mémoires” Memories, “Destins” Destinies,…) is wide-reaching, from astronomical infinity « ténèbres solaires » solar darkness) to the microscopic (« Mutation végétale” Plant mutation) : a profuse and varied production, regularly exhibited at his home, in various public and private exhibition spaces and, most significantly, at the Salon Comparaison of which he was the curator for the Tapestry section.   Origin : the artist’s workshop
  • Destins  (Destinies)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Glaudin-Brivet workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°1/6. 1974.       Originally an engraver (Prix de Rome, intaglio technique in 1942), Jean-Louis Viard designed his first tapestry cartoons in the mid 1950’s. At first his work was figurative (he was collaborating at the time with Picart Le Doux), but then he evolved along the same lines as many other painter-cartoonists of the period (Matégot, Tourlière or Prassinos,...) towards abstraction. He produced scores of cartoons working up until the 2000’s, in parallel to his work as a painter and engraver, but throughout revealing a particular interest for the use of contrasting materials and textures in the tradition of the “Nouvelle Tapisserie” of which Pierre Daquin was one of the leading lights.   The inspiration for his motifs, sometimes metaphysical (“Mémoires” Memories, “Destins” Destinies,…) is wide-reaching, from astronomical infinity « ténèbres solaires » solar darkness) to the microscopic (« Mutation végétale” Plant mutation) : a profuse and varied production, regularly exhibited at his home, in various public and private exhibition spaces and, most significantly, at the Salon Comparaison of which he was the curator for the Tapestry section.   Origin : the artist’s workshop
  • Fleur de roc (rock flower)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. n°2/4. Circa 1970.     Originally a sculptor exploiting very diverse materials (steel, concrete, clay…), Borderie came to tapestry with immense enthusiasm in the 1950’s with the weaving of his first cartoon in 1957. Receiving encouragement from Denise Majorel, he was awarded the Grand Prix National de la Tapisserie in 1962. In 1974 he was appointed as director at the Ecole Nationale des Arts Décoratifs at Aubusson but he resigned from this post shortly thereafter. He designed over 500 painted cartoons, abstracts using simple shapes, shading in a limited palette of colours and weaving with gros points.   A dynamic abstraction with a limited colour scheme running from orange to brown, abstract motifs which play on the plastic effect of light passing through the colours : a classic cartoon from André Borderie.     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue André Borderie « pour l’homme simplement », Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1998. J.J. et B. Wattel, André Borderie et la tapisserie d'Aubusson, Editions Louvre Victoire, 2018, ill.  p.22
  • les oiseaux (birds)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. n°4/6. Circa 1970.       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. Here birds and trelliswork cohabit in a style very reminiscent of Picart le Doux.

  • Abatonn

        Tapestry woven in the Saint-Cyr workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°EA1. Circa 1980.   Originally an engraver (Prix de Rome, intaglio technique in 1942), Jean-Louis Viard designed his first tapestry cartoons in the mid 1950’s. At first his work was figurative (he was collaborating at the time with Picart Le Doux), but then he evolved along the same lines as many other painter-cartoonists of the period (Matégot, Tourlière or Prassinos,...) towards abstraction. He produced scores of cartoons working up until the 2000’s, in parallel to his work as a painter and engraver, but throughout revealing a particular interest for the use of contrasting materials and textures in the tradition of the “Nouvelle Tapisserie” of which Pierre Daquin was one of the leading lights.   The inspiration for his motifs, sometimes metaphysical (“Mémoires” Memories, “Destins” Destinies,…) is wide-reaching, from astronomical infinity « ténèbres solaires » solar darkness) to the microscopic (« Mutation végétale” Plant mutation) : a profuse and varied production, regularly exhibited at his home, in various public and private exhibition spaces and, most significantly, at the Salon Comparaison of which he was the curator for the Tapestry section.   Origin : the artist’s workshop
  • Psaume nocturne (Nocturnal psalm)

      Tapestry woven in the Clochard workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°1/6. 1980.   Originally an engraver (Prix de Rome, intaglio technique in 1942), Jean-Louis Viard designed his first tapestry cartoons in the mid 1950’s. At first his work was figurative (he was collaborating at the time with Picart Le Doux), but then he evolved along the same lines as many other painter-cartoonists of the period (Matégot, Tourlière or Prassinos,...) towards abstraction. He produced scores of cartoons working up until the 2000’s, in parallel to his work as a painter and engraver, but throughout revealing a particular interest for the use of contrasting materials and textures in the tradition of the “Nouvelle Tapisserie” of which Pierre Daquin was one of the leading lights.   The inspiration for his motifs, sometimes metaphysical (“Mémoires” Memories, “Destins” Destinies,…) is wide-reaching, from astronomical infinity « ténèbres solaires » solar darkness) to the microscopic (« Mutation végétale” Plant mutation) : a profuse and varied production, regularly exhibited at his home, in various public and private exhibition spaces and, most significantly, at the Salon Comparaison of which he was the curator for the Tapestry section.   Origin : the artist’s workshop
  • Ichtyonis

        Tapestry woven in the Raymond workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°EA1. Circa 1980.   Originally an engraver (Prix de Rome, intaglio technique in 1942), Jean-Louis Viard designed his first tapestry cartoons in the mid 1950’s. At first his work was figurative (he was collaborating at the time with Picart Le Doux), but then he evolved along the same lines as many other painter-cartoonists of the period (Matégot, Tourlière or Prassinos,...) towards abstraction. He produced scores of cartoons working up until the 2000’s, in parallel to his work as a painter and engraver, but throughout revealing a particular interest for the use of contrasting materials and textures in the tradition of the “Nouvelle Tapisserie” of which Pierre Daquin was one of the leading lights.   The inspiration for his motifs, sometimes metaphysical (“Mémoires” Memories, “Destins” Destinies,…) is wide-reaching, from astronomical infinity « ténèbres solaires » solar darkness) to the microscopic (« Mutation végétale” Plant mutation) : a profuse and varied production, regularly exhibited at his home, in various public and private exhibition spaces and, most significantly, at the Salon Comparaison of which he was the curator for the Tapestry section.   Origin : the artist’s workshop
  • Danseuses cambodgiennes (Cambodian dancers)

          Tapestry woven at Aubusson by the Picaud workshop. Certificate of origin, n° 1/4. Circa 1965.     Although somewhat overlooked now, the contribution that Maurice Ferréol made, in the 1960’s, to the design of figurative tapestry is quite remarkable. He proposed a style redolent of popular imagery where the use of pure blocks of colour exacerbates the almost childlike outline of the figures. What connects these bright and garishly coloured, masked  figures to Cambodia?  They are simply a pretext for a profusion of colours and  motifs in the particular characteristic style of Ferréol.
  • La roue (the wheel)

    Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. Complete with certificate of origin. Circa 1970.     Perrot began his career as a cartoon designer at the end of the war, making almost 500 cartoons including numerous commissions from the state, most of which were woven at Aubusson. His style which is particularly rich and decorative is eminently recognisable : a crowd of butterflies or birds, most often, stands out against a background of vegetation, reminiscent of the millefleurs tapestries (which would also inspire Dom Robert).   The mediaeval inspiration of  a flower-studded, khaki background, numerous birds, all the characteristic elements of Perrot’s cartoons can be found in this particular example.   Bibliography: Tapisseries, dessins, peintures, gravures de René Perrot, Dessein et Tolra, 1982
  • Automne solognot (Sologne autumn)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°2/6. Circa 1970.     Perrot began his career as a cartoon designer at the end of the war, making almost 500 cartoons including numerous commissions from the state, most of which were woven at Aubusson. His style which is particularly rich and decorative is eminently recognisable : a crowd of butterflies or birds, most often, stands out against a background of vegetation, reminiscent of the millefleurs tapestries (which would also inspire Dom Robert). The motif of fish in profile swimming in water in the lower part of the cartoon, beneath other elements is recurrent in Lurçat’s work (for example “L’eau et le feu’, Cité de la Tapisserie, Aubusson). With Perrot the same motif gives rise to a less ambitious vision : fish and birdlife here represent, in a realistic fashion, the sports of hunting and fishing as practised in the Sologne area in Autumn.   Bibliography: Tapisseries, dessins, peintures, gravures de René Perrot, Dessein et Tolra, 1982
  • Galathée

          Aubusson tapestry woven by the Picaud workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n° 1 of 4. 1970.     Loewer designed his first cartoon in 1953 ; his early works are first figurative before turning to abstraction (like Matégot) which is exclusively geometric in Loewer’s case. He designed over 180 cartoons, most of which were woven by his friend, Raymond Picaud. Only one example of this tapestry was woven according to the catalogue raisonné, « Galathée » is representative of the artist’s style around 1970 where the recurrent design motif is the square used in superpositions. Bibliography : Claude Loewer, l’évasion calculée : travaux de 1939 à 1993, catalogue raisonné des tapisseries de 1953 à 1974, Sylvio Acatos, Charlotte Hug, Walter Tschopp and Marc-Olivier Wahler, Artcatos, 1994, n°120
  • Soleil carré (square sun)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°EX-A. Circa 1965.     Matégot, originally a decorator, then creator of artefacts and furniture (an activity he abandoned in 1959) met François Tabard in 1945 and gave him his first cartoons, first of all figurative then rapidly of abstract design in the 1950’s. He became a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres Cartonniers de Tapisserie) in 1949, participated in many international exhibitions (Matégot, like Lurçat before him, was an untiring advocate of the art of tapestry) fulfilled numerous public commissions, sometimes of monumental proportions (“Rouen” 85m2 for the Préfecture of the Seine Maritime département, and also tapestries for Orly Airport, for the Maison de la Radio, for the IMF...) and designed no fewer than 629 cartoons up until the 1970’s. In 1990 the Matégot foundation for contemporary tapestry was inaugurated in Bethesda, U.S.A. Matégot is an artist, like Wogensky, Tourlière or Prassinos, who turns wool textiles resolutely towards the abstract: at first lyrical, geometric in the 70’s, exploiting various technical aspects of the loom : colour graduations, shading, irregularities...   « Soleil carré » (Square sun - a contradiction in terms) also illustrates Matégot’s style in the mid-60’s, where shadow and light are in open confrontation : from the upper right hand part of the tapestry the colours radiate outwards dispersing the darkness in concentric fashion.   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue, Matégot, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1990-1991 Patrick Favardin, Mathieu Matégot, Editions Norma, 2014
  • La huppe blanche (the white crest)

      Aubusson tapestry woven  in the Hamot workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist. 1961.   J     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ... This cartoon is a variation  on n° 97 in Bruzeau’s book : it is one of a series taking the exotic as their subject (South America would influence numerous cartoons by Lurçat), starting with “Orénoque” (one copy is conserved in Angers at the Musée JeanLurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine) in 1956,  and of which the cartoons of 1961-62 constitute so many variations : the same plant motifs (ferns and philodendrons,...) the same birds,.... here, however, as with “Amazonie’, the background is white.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Normands sur la Seine (Norsemen on the Seine)

      Tapestry woven at Aubusson by the Pinton workshop. Signed certificate of origin n° 1. 1961.   Lars Gynning is one of  the numerous artists of  various origins whose work would be woven in Aubusson during the years from the 50’s to  the 70’s, at a period when tapestry imposed itself as an artistic medium. From a thematic point of view, this cartoon can be seen as a referrence, across the centuries,  to Franco-Scandinavian relations seen through the prism of Viking incursions up the Seine estuary : an inevitable throw-back to the Bayeux tapestry.   However, rather than a historic or diplomatic statement by Gynning, the cartoon in fact illustrates a saga by Evart Taube, the 20th century Swedish national poet (an extract from the text is woven at the bottom of the tapestry) ; added to the subject itself, the textile rendition of an epic saga is a gesture in the direction of the great mediaeval tapestry tradition, which was an inevitable model for many painter-cartoonists of the period. The aesthetic, which is resolutely contemporary and influenced by cubism, revitalises an ancient subject.
  • Poissons de la lune (Moon fish)

          Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. Complete with certificate of origin. Circa 1960.   Fumeron designed his first cartoons (he would ultimately make over 500) in the 1940’s, in collaboration with the Pinton workshop, he was then commissioned on numerous occasions by the state before participating in the decoration of the ocean liner “France”. His work was figurative to begin with and influenced by Lurçat, then turned towards abstraction, before coming back to a style characterised by colourful figurative and realistic depictions from the 1980’s onwards.   Beneath the red moon, fish, butterflies, a lobster all frolic in a dream-like composition typical of the artist : numerous examples of these motifs can be found for instance in  “Avant l’homme” Before man, woven by the Gobelins  (cf Exhibition Catalogue “le Mobilier National et les Manufactures Nationales des Gobelins et de Beauvais sous la IVe République”, Beauvais 1997)
  • La flamme (the flame)

          Portalegre tapestry woven by the Fino workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n°2/6. Circa 1965.   Matégot, originally a decorator, then creator of artefacts and furniture (an activity he abandoned in 1959) met François Tabard in 1945 and gave him his first cartoons, first of all figurative then rapidly of abstract design in the 1950’s. He became a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres Cartonniers de Tapisserie) in 1949, participated in many international exhibitions (Matégot, like Lurçat before him, was an untiring advocate of the art of tapestry) fulfilled numerous public commissions, sometimes of monumental proportions (“Rouen” 85m2 for the Préfecture of the Seine Maritime département, and also tapestries for Orly Airport, for the Maison de la Radio, for the IMF...) and designed no fewer than 629 cartoons up until the 1970’s. In 1990 the Matégot foundation for contemporary tapestry was inaugurated in Bethesda, U.S.A. Matégot is an artist, like Wogensky, Tourlière or Prassinos, who turns wool textiles resolutely towards the abstract: at first lyrical, geometric in the 70’s, exploiting various technical aspects of the loom : colour graduations, shading, irregularities... An abstract cartoon characteristic of the artist’s production in the mid-1960’s : the evocation of the flame, stylised and in an agressive violet hue, refers directly to Matégot’s interest in industry and all things technical but also to the interplay of woven transparencies of which he made himself a master.   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue, Matégot, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1990-1991
  • Les comédiens (The actors)

          Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. N°4/6. 1959.     Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design...) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology... refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate.   Themes of music, drama and more specifically the Commedia dell’Arte (« la Comédie Italienne », a cartoon dating from 1947) are omnipresent in Saint-Saëns’s production : here he presents the figures of Lelio and Isabelle, strikingly drawn, slightly humorous figures, presented here in their traditional costumes.         Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, galerie La Demeure, 1970 Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, the tapestries, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapestries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1997-1998
  • La harpe des mers (Harp of the ocean)

          Tapestry woven in the Berthaut workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist. 1954.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ... « La harpe des mers » (Harp of the ocean) (Bruzeau n° 60) just as its companion piece « La harpe des forêts” (Harp of the forest), identical in size, is one of a set of cartoons by Picart le Doux dealing with the theme of the lyre and the harp : the geometrical rigour and graphic power of the parallel strings were a particular inspiration to the artist. Here, music and nature are closely associated (cf “l’arbre-lyre” the tree lyre from 1953) and Orphée Orpheus (a cartoon from 1952) is the single figure which encapsulates this assimilation.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • Hommage à l'abbé Breuil (a tribute to Father Breuil)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. Complete with certificate of origin. Circa 1970.     Perrot began his career as a cartoon designer at the end of the war, making almost 500 cartoons including numerous commissions from the state, most of which were woven at Aubusson. His style which is particularly rich and decorative is eminently recognisable : a crowd of butterflies or birds, most often, stands out against a background of vegetation, reminiscent of the millefleurs tapestries (which would also inspire Dom Robert).   Uncharacteristic cartoon whose inspiration lies in the cave paintings at Lascaux ; here it can be said that never has a tapestry merited quite so well  the term « wall art ». Perrot’s input is, in the end, relatively modest : the use of saturated colours (particularly the mauve-pink background), the overlapping of the motifs (which are more spaced out in the cave itself), superficial laid over  blotching,... If Perrot is an habitué of  hommage-cartoons (Pergaud, Redouté, Audubon,...) this particular example is interesting because of the well-established proximity between the artist and the dedicatee, “the Pope of Prehistory”: here the hommage owes nothing to the artificiality of an official commission.   Bibliography : Tapisseries, dessins, peintures, gravures de René Perrot, Dessein et Tolra, 1982
  • Nature morte (still life)

        Gobelins  tapestry woven by G. Bonnevialle. Complete with label. 1930-1931 (after a 1921 painting).     An establishment artist of classical training, Migonney spent many long years in Algeria, which would furnish the subject of much of his work. He gave several cartoons to the Ecole Nationale d’Art Décoratif in Aubusson (along with Véra, Valtat...), whose exhibition stand at the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs in 1925 included a panel bearing one of his tapestries.   This piece is a detail, woven after the artist’s death, taken from a spectacular work (137x205cm) dating from 1921 which hangs in the Musée de Brou in Bourg en Bresse, “Still life with fruit”. It reveals all the weaving detail and nuances which constituted the art of the Gobelin weavers when reproducing a painting, techniques whose use Lurcat would soon make a point of  opposing.   Bibliography : Exhibition Cat. Tapisseries 1925, Aubusson, Cité de la Tapisserie, 2012
  • Complainte (Complaint)

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. Certificate of origin signed by the artist n° 1 of 3. 1976.       Sautour-Gaillard had his first cartoon woven in 1971 by the Legoueix workshop (a collaboration which was to last), and from then on he designed many very large-scale projects of which the most spectacular was “Pour un certain idéal” a series of 17 tapestries dealing with the theme of Olympianism (property of the Musée de l’Olympisme in Lausanne). If at first close to lyrical abstraction, the artist produced in the 1990’s cartoons superimposing different decorative motifs, textures and figures whose unity originated in the woven texture itself.   « Complainte » reveals a certain proximity of the artist, in his early work, to the abstract world of Soulages ou Schneider. We recognise, transposed into the wool medium, the gestures,the overflows, characteristic of the artists of the “envolée lyrique”, in a severely limited range of colours.   Bibliography : D. Cavelier, Jean-René Sautour-Gaillard, la déchirure, Lelivredart, 2013, ill.p.162
  • Nymphes et chasseurs (Nymphs and hunters)

          Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop for the Compagnie des Arts Français. 1941.   The place occupied by André Planson in the history of tapestry-making is a direct result of the role that was alotted to him by Jacques Adnet in the synthesis of art and design advocated by the Compagnie des Arts Français of which he was the director. As early as 1941, Adnet approached several painters (Brianchon, Vera,... and Planson) to design tapestry cartoons in the context of furniture and interior design : “our intention was to demonstrate that contemporary tapestries have much to contribute to the integrated design of a room” (L. Chéronnet, Jacques Adnet, Art et Industrie 1948). The Compagnie des Arts Français organised throughout the 1940’s tapestry exhibitions on its premises. These ambitious decorative aspirations, which were important in encouraging the renewal of the art of the tapestry, remain however somewhat irrelevant to the preoccupations of Lurçat and his followers.   The gracious and joyful attributes (compare with the contemporary creations of Lurçat or Gromaire) of the Compagnie are plainly evident in this cartoon dating from 1941 which brings right up to date the traditional tapestry themes of the hunting scene and bucolic pleasures in a voluntarily innovative style which is highly decorative. Although certain technical innovations typical of the Lurçat doctrine are already assimilated (limited palette, irregular stitch size) it is to be noted that this decorative intention is still influenced by techniques associated with painting (the use of perspective, and shading for flesh colours...)
  • Camargue

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist n° 4 of 6. 1963.   With a taste for the large-scale, influenced by Untersteller at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, Hilaire undertook numerous mural paintings. In the same vein, beginning in 1949, along with a number of other artists stimulated by Lurçat, (he would join the latter at the A.P.C.T. Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) he designed a number of cartoons some of which were woven at Beauvais or at Les Gobelins.   His figurative cubist-influenced style (which sometimes approaches abstraction) is immediately recognisable in his tapestry cartoons : in this one, but also for example in the one designed for the Salon Fontainebleau for the ocean liner France, “Sous-bois” (undergrowth) (190 x 988 cm, Pinton frères, reproduced in Le paquebot France, Armelle Bouchet Mazas, Paris 2006p. 169) where shapes and colours are fragmented in a kaleidoscopic fashion. “Camargue” is reproduced in the “Tapisserie d’Aubusson” sample collection of the Guéret Chamber of Commerce and Industry published in the early 1980’s to illstrate the technical competence of the Aubusson workshops.   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Hilaire, œuvre tissé, galerie Verrière, 1970 (ill.) Exhibition catalogue, du trait à la lumière, Musée Départemental Georges de la Tour at Vic-sur-Seille, 2010.
     
     
  • Rambouillet

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n° 1 of 6. Circa 1970.     Perrot began his career as a cartoon designer at the end of the war, making almost 500 cartoons including numerous commissions from the state, most of which were woven at Aubusson. His style which is particularly rich and decorative is eminently recognisable : a crowd of butterflies or birds, most often, stands out against a background of vegetation, reminiscent of the millefleurs tapestries (which would also inspire Dom Robert).   René Perrot is essentially an animal artist who habitually uses stylisation. His decorative style is counterweighted here by the extreme realism with which the stag is represented, rare in post-war tapestry. The title of the cartoon is a throw-back to the grand French hunting tradition which he abundantly illustrated, for example in “Sologne”, which was donated to  the Musée de la Chasse in Gien by the Mobilier National.  
  • Les Dauphins (Dolphins)

          Aubusson tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n° 6 of 8. 1959.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   Reproduced as n° 95 in Bruzeau, the latter comments : « Perfect symbolism of a theme already treat ed ».  It is true that, from the very beginning, Picart le Doux made recurrent use of  the theme of the sea, and particularly with “le Dauphin” (the Dolphin) in 1951 (Bruzeau n° 27). This cartoon, though rather more stylised, is typical of the symetry favoured by the artist and is executed in a colour scheme redolent of the sea bed.     Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972
  • Composition

      Aubusson tapestry woven by the Tabard workshop. Complete with certificate of origin, worn , signed by the artist. 1964 or 1965.       From early on in his career, Mortensen, favoured an abstract painting style. He settled in Paris in 1947 and showed his works, with other artists also inclined to geometric abstraction, at the Denise René gallery. In 1952 under the aegis of François Tabard and Vasarely an exhibition titled « 12 original tapestries » opened at the gallery where, in the company of Le Corbusier and Léger, there appeared works by Deyrolle, Taueber-Arp and Mortensen who thus became the first abstract painters to be reproduced in tapestry and a new art form was born (in this context, it must not be forgotten that this is the period where the “Lurçat style” was absolutely dominant) which Gilioli, Matégot and Tourlière will all subsequently claim as their own. Mortensen’s collaboration with the “René-Tabard tapestries” will last until 1968, even though he returned to his native Denmark in 1964. The 14 works of the artist which will be woven are characterised by his large-scale geometrical  compositions, using bright, light and contrasting colours in large expanses of colour, which the weavers of the Tabard workshop reproduce with great success. .   This tapestry is one of the 3 tapestries woven by the Tabard workshop in 1964-1965 to have no title (cf. Catalogue of the tapestries woven by the Tabard workshop), each of the 3 is a one-off piece.   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue, Aubusson, la voie abstraite, Aubusson, Musée départmental de la Tapisserie, 1993
  • Combat devant Florence (Combat before Florence)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Goubely-Gatien workshop. With partially erased certificate of origin. 1966.   An enthusiastic mural artist as early as 1937 (he participated in the Exposition Internationale), Lagrange designed his first cartoons in 1945, and became one of the founding members of the A.P.C.T. His early cartoons were expressionist (like Matégot and Tourlière), then his work evolved towards a stylisation (dating from his collaboration with Pierre Baudouin) which would bring him in the 1970’s to a highly refined style using very pure colours. As well as his important rôle in the tapestry renaissance movement of the period (and the state commissions that went with it), Lagrange would become a teacher at the Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts, a regular collaborator with Jacques Tati, a designer of monumental elements incorporated in various architectural projects and a recognised painter close to Estève and Lapicque.   In the 1960’s, the artist made various large-scale works based on the mediaeval theme of battles and tournaments, in a geometrical and stylised vision, of which the most noted example is the “Hommage to Paulo Uccello” (280 x 680 cm, of which a copy is kept at the Faculty of Science in Besançon). Here, in a style that is still figurative, Lagrange illustrates a battle scene against the city of Florence in the background with its highly recognisable monuments (the Duomo, the bell tower of the Palazzo Vecchio..) The frieze-like scene, inspired by Uccello’s paintings, shows spears, horses and knights intermingled. Of note : the marled beige and brown background against which these elements stand out is specific to Lagrange and was only rarely used by his co-designers.   Bibliography : Cat. Exh. Lagrange tapisseries, Galerie La demeure, 1968, n°4 (reproduit) Cat. Exh. Tapisseries d'Aubusson, Galerie d'Art Municipale, Luxembourg, n°4 in the catalogue (not illustrated) Robert Guinot, Jacques Lagrange, les couleurs de la vie, Lucien Souny editeur, 2005, n°40, illustrated (dimensions given 226 x 268 cm) J.J. et B. Wattel, Jacques Lagrange et ses toiles : peintures, tapisseries, cinéma, Editions Louvre Victoire, 2020
  • Automne-Hiver (Autumn-Winter)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. Complete with certificate of origin n° 6 of 6. Circa 1975.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   The theme of the seasons is a classic in the history of tapestry which was enthusiastically ressuscitated by the 20th century  cartoon artists, of whom Lurçat was foremost (cf his Seasons wall hanging commissioned by the state in 1939). For Picart le Doux the inspiration is two-fold : Nature obviously but also Music ; “l’Hiver” (Winter) an allegorical treatment of the theme and one of the best-known works of this artist dates from 1950, but it is the “Hommage à Vivaldi” (Homage to Vivaldi) from 1963, with its 4 seasons represented in symbolic fashion by coloured suns, featuring symbols from the zodiac and fronds of vegetation that is the source of this cartoon where the motifs are reworked in a horizontal format.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d'art, 1972
  • La cage ouverte (the open cage)

     
    Tapisserie d’Aubusson tissée par l’atelier Berthaut. Avec son bolduc signé de l'artiste. 1953.   Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   Birds are a recurrent motif in the artist’s work in the first half of the 1950’s (“la cage ouverte” the open cage, one of the most successful works of this artist, dates from 1953, Picart le Doux here comes back to the same cartoon but with a few minimal changes), as well as the tongues of flame punctuating the edges of the cage. Added to this is the limited colour scheme which is not a little redolent of traditional foliage.   Bibliography : Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d’art, 1972 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980
  • La mare aux oiseaux (The bird pond)

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Goubely workshop. N° II. 1941.   Gromaire’s woven pieces are few in number : 11 cartoons, designed between 1938 and 1944, most of them in Aubusson. “His rigorous construction, his use of simplification, his penchant for grand composition and grand fundamental ideas, his knowledgeable use of colour and in sum his supreme quality as a master-craftsman, all of those things were to make of him one of the most expert tapestry artists of his time”, so wrote Jean Cassou (Exhibition catalogue, Marcel Gromaire, Paris, Musée Nationale d’art moderne, 1963). It was Guillaume Janneau, then in the chair of the Mobilier National, who contacted him in 1938, convinced that his style (simplification of shape, geometrical designs framed in black, influenced by cubism, limited colour schemes…) would have something to contribute to the resolution of the new aesthetic problems that the art of tapestry would have to confront in order to bring about its renewal (simplified palette, synthetic cartoon design...) firstly with a commission for a work on the theme of the four elements, then with a second (“les saisons”, the seasons) which would be produced at Aubusson. In 1940 Gromaire joined Lurçat and Dubrueil there. Working alone, with great  meticulosity (numerous drawings anticipate the cartoon which is painted rather than numbered as with Lurçat), in close collaboration with Suzanne Goubely, who would weave all his cartoons, he spent 4 years in Aubusson, during which time he devoted all his creative energy to tapestry. At the end of the war, he left the Creuse and produced no more cartoons, leaving to Lurçat the position of grand initiator of the tapestry renewal movement.   The bird pond is typical of the aesthetic expressed by Gromaire in his tapestries, by its extremely decorative, almost dream-like quality (quite different from his graphic works), by the choice of subject, both animal and vegetable (and even architectural) and particularly influenced by the Creuse region. It is the extraordinary density, the proliferation and profusion which are particularly striking and which make Gromaire’s work in textile so inimitable.   Bibliography : Le Point, Aubusson et la renaissance de la tapisserie, mars 1946, ill. p.34 Muraille et laine, éditions pierre Tisné, 1946, ill. n°51 Exhibition catalogue Tapisseries d’Aubusson, Luxembourg, Galerie d’art municipale, 1982, n° 3 Exhibition catalogue, Gromaire, œuvre tissée, Aubusson, Musée de la tapisserie, 1995, ill. on p 51 Exhibition catalogue La manufacture des Gobelins dans la première moitié du XXe siècle, Beauvais, Galerie nationale de la tapisserie, 1999.  
     
  • A tous vents (Windblown)

          Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. Complete with certificate of origin. 1962-1963.   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.   Spectacular cartoon (27 m2 !) and an exceptional private commission for a specific place (the hall of the patron’s home) that Lurçat received towards the end of his life where he brings together a busy profusion of his signature motifs : sun, stars, butterflies, but also and more rarely, tortoise, cat, .. The correspondance exchanged between Lurçat and his patron reveals his great accessability (at a time when Lurçat, at the height of his fame, is constantly in demand and spends much of his time on the “Chant du Monde”) and the depth of his well-argued reflection in response to the commission : the self-proclaimed “doctor of wools” chooses a yellow background (favoured over black “too solemn for the hall in the home of a young couple”), “the wall covered from end to end ...” “a royal solution” “according to the tradition of great tapestry-making”,... As can be seen, the patron saw no reason to quibble with any of these artistic choices.     Origin : Private collection, Lyon (a copy of the correspondance between Lurçat, the Tabard workshop and the patron will be given to the purchaser)     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Jean Lurçat, Tapisseries nouvelles, Maison de la pensée Française, 1956 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 Exhibition Catalogue L'homme et ses lumières, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, 1992 Symposium Jean Lurçat et la renaissance de la tapisserie in Aubusson, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la tapisserie 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
  • Papillons (Butterflies)

      Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton frères workshop. With original certificate Lurçat’s artistic production was immense : it is however his role as the renovator of the art of tapestry design which ensured 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, drawn and numbered cartons.   A huge production then follows (over 1000 cartons) amplified by his desire to include his painter friends, the creation of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapiisserie) and the collaboration with the art gallery La Demeure and Denise Majorel, and then by his assumed role promotion the medium around the world (le Monde ?)   His tapestries reveal a pictorial world which is specifically decorative, with a very personal symbolic iconography, cosmogonical (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.   His journey to Brazil in 1954 was a decisive source of inspiration for Lurçat : the flora and fauna (particularly the butterflies, a recurrent theme) of the Amazon appear repeatedly : “What interests me with the butterfly, ... is the extraordinary inventiveness of the interlacing forms, the sparkling colours, the total freedom of their coloration...” (Claude Faux, Lurçat à haute voix, 1962, p. 151). Butterflies on a yellow background are a motif which recurs in several cartons : “Paon de nuit”, “Copacabana”, “Papillons Marcenac”... Bibliography : Exhibition Cat. Jean Lurçat, Tapisseries nouvelles, Maison de la pensée Française, 1956 Exhibition Cat.. Les domaines de Jean Lurçat, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, 1986 Symposium Jean Lurçat et la renaissance de la tapisserie à Aubusson, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1992 Exhibition Cat. Jean Lurçat, Donation Simone Lurçat, Académie des Beaux-Arts, 2004 Jean Lurçat, le chant du Monde, Angers, 2007
  • Concert champêtre (Outdoor concert)

    Aubusson tapestry woven in the Picaud workshop for the Verriere Gallery of Lyons. Complete with its certificate signed by the artist ; n° 1 of 4. Circa 1970   « It is thus easy to understand that, having based my painting on my love of tapestry, it was relatively easy for me, and particularly tempting, to produce tapestries which were faithful to my painting” writes the artist in the exhibition catalogue for the 1970 show at the Galerie Verrière. It is not until 1961 that he started making designs (over 50) both for woven tapestries (at Aubusson, but also for the Mobilier National with, on occasion, the collaboration of Pierre Baudoin), but also those employing needlepoint. The artist’s very audacious palette is immediately recognisable in these cartons, with their use of primary colours or, as here, revolving around a very vivid pink with a rather dislocated storyline between the concert in the foreground and the hunting scene in the distance.     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue, Expo Lapicque, Lyons, Galerie Verrière 1970
  • Saint François parlant aux animaux (St Francis talking to the animals)

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Perathon workshop. Circa 1940.       Jean Bazaine, like many of his contemporaries, was a prolific mural artist particularly for large scale edifices. Although he is above all recognised as a designer of stained glass windows and mosaics, he was also making tapestry cartoons as early as the 1930’s. These pieces formed part of the renewal of religious art of which Bazaine would be one of the principal protagonists, particularly after the war. Jean Bazaine, in association with l’abbé Morel (one of those foremost in promoting the introduction of abstract art into churches), was at the head of a painters’ workshop from 1936 to 1937 hence, undoubtedly, the preoccupations which he had already voiced in the domain of religious art. This particular cartoon, figurative in character, (Bazaine would abandon figurative representation during the war period) employing traditional iconography, is thus a modest example of the artist’s first steps in both mural and religious art.
  • Nuage (Cloud)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist, n° 1 of 6 1975.       Lurçat approached Saint-Saëns, originally a painter of murals, in 1940. And during the war the latter produced the first of his allegorical masterpieces, tapestries reflecting indignation, combat, resistance : “les Vierges folles (the foolish virgins), “Thésée et le Minotaure” (Theseus and the Minotaur). At the end of the war, as a natural development he joined up with Lurçat, whose convictions he shared (concerning a simplified palette, outlined cartoons with colours indicated by pre-ordained numbers, and the specific nature of tapestry design...) at the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie). His universe, where the human figure, stretched, elongated, ooccupies an important place (particularly when compared to his companions Lurçat or Picart le Doux), pivots around traditional themes : woman, the Commedia dell’arte, Greek mythology... refined by the brilliance of the colours and the simplification of the layout. His work would evolve later, in the 1960’s, towards cartoons of a more lyrical design, almost abstract where elemental and cosmic forces would dominate. “Nuage” is one of these works : in a mood that is both poetic and dream-like (who has never imagined anthropomorphic shapes when contemplating clouds in the sky?), a cloud appears in a human form (or is it the reverse?), using shapes both willowy and elegant. According to the exhibition catalogues devoted to the artist, only two copies were made of this tapestry.                   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Saint-Saëns, the tapestries, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1987 Exhibition catalogue Marc Saint-Saëns, tapestries, 1935-1979, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine 1997-1998
  • Mosaïque (mosaic)

        Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton frères workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist. Circa 1960.   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 Tapiisserie) 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.   According to tradtion, the salamander can resist fire : thus in Lurçat’s output it can be seen as an allegory of fire, in the “chant du monde” particularly (in l’eau et le feu”, the salamander is associated with fish). Here, it radiates, surrounded by flames, in a general environment where vegetation dominates except at this particular point where it appears to have been removed. Here therefore, the salamander joins, in his personal bestiary, other lizards which appear regularly in the tapestries using compartments/chequers (cf eg “le jardin du rêveur”, 1947, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine).   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogueJean Lurçat, Tapisseries nouvelles, Maison de la pensée Française, 1956 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 Jean Lurçat, Donation Soùone Lurçat, Académie des Beaux-Arts, 2004 Jean Lurçat, le chant du monde angers 2007.
  • Envie et Gourmandise (les pêchés capitaux) (Envy and Gluttony – the seven deadly sins)

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Legoueix workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist. 1956.   After the traditional completion of some mural paintings in the 1930’s, he then arrived in Aubusson in 1936, became closely associated with Picart le Doux in 1947 and then joined the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie). From then on he devoted himself to tapestry with zeal and designed 167 cartoons, at first figurative following on from Picart le Doux and Saint-Saëns, then, influenced by the scientific themes that he dealt with, tending more towards abstraction. In 1981, two years before his death, he donated his studio to the Musée départemental de la tapisserie in Aubusson.   « He considers… in this short but extremely witty series, the vices and his treatment  reveals a malicious sense of humour returning in an original way to a theme much used during the middle ages.” (Exhibition catalogue “Hommage à Louis-Marie Jullien, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1983, p.4) Here the subject is a pretext for the representation of animals such as can be found in the work of his contemporaries, notably Picart le Doux with whom he was closely associated. According to the 1983 exhibition catalogue (which is considered to be the catalogue raisonné and in which this piece appears as number 53), only one tapestry was ever woven from this cartoon: it is thus unique.     Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue Hommage à Louis-Marie Jullien, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1983
  • Le Chalut (the trawler)

      Aubusson tapestry woven by the Berthaut workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist. 1952.     Jean Picart le Doux is one of the foremost figures in the renaissance of the art of tapestry. His earliest contributions to the field date back to 1943 when he designed cartoons for the passenger ship “la Marseillaise”. A close associate of Lurçat, whose theories he would adopt (limited palette, numbered cartoons...), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie), and soon after, a teacher at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state gave him several commissions most of them at the Aubusson workshop, and some at the Gobelins : the most spectacular of these being for the University of Caen, the Theatre in Le Mans, the passenger ship France or the Prefecture of the Creuse département ... In as much as Picart le Doux’s aesthetic is close to that of Lurçat, so also is his insipiration and his subject matter, although in a register which is more decorative than symbolic, where he brings together heavenly bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars...), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds...), man, literary quotation ...   « One of the best-known of Picart le Doux’s tapestries : it is highly organised and the generous curves of the trawl net underline the choice of a large and simple graphic.” Is how Maurice Bruzeau describes this tapestry (n° 37 in his book) in the commentary he devotes to it. “The trawler” is typical of the marine themes which are omnipresent in this  artist’s work, particularly at this period : “Dieu Marin (marine god), “La Sirène” (the mermaid), “le Dauphin” (the dolphin), “Fruits de mer” (shellfish), “Etoiles de mer” (starfish), in a range of muted colours revolving around kaki and silver grey. Here the treatment of the theme is more documentary (apart from the presence of a trident) : the subject is fishing, as it appears to Picart le Doux.   Bibliography : Léon Moussinac, Jean Picart le Doux, Editions Cercle d’art,1964 (ill. Pl.10) Marthe Belle-Jouffray, Jean Picart le Doux, Publications filmées d’art et d’histoire, 1966, ill. n°4 Exhibition catalogue, Hommage à Jean Picart le Doux, Centre artistique et littéraire de Rochechouart, 1968 (ill.) Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs du soleil, Editions Cercle d’art 1972 Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Paris, Musée de la Poste, 1980 (ill.) Exhibition Catalogue Picart le Doux, château d'Olonne, 1992 (ill.)
  • Remous (swell)

      Aubusson tapestry woven in the Tabard workshop. Circa 1960.   Matégot, originally a decorator, then creator of artefacts and furniture (an activity he abandoned in 1959) met François Tabard in 1945 and gave him his first cartoons, first of all figurative then rapidly of abstract design in the 1950’s. He became a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres Cartonniers de Tapisserie) in 1949, participated in many international exhibitions (Matégot, like Lurçat before him, was an untiring advocate of the art of tapestry) fulfilled numerous public commissions, sometimes of monumental proportions (“Rouen” 85m2 for the Préfecture of the Seine Maritime département, and also tapestries for Orly Airport, for the Maison de la Radio, for the IMF...) and designed no fewer than 629 cartoons up until the 1970’s. In 1990 the Matégot foundation for contemporary tapestry was inaugurated in Bethesda, U.S.A. Matégot is an artist, like Wogensky, Tourlière or Prassinos, who turns wool textiles resolutely towards the abstract: at first lyrical, geometric in the 70’s, exploiting various technical aspects of the loom : colour graduations, shading, irregularities...   Remous can be seen as representative of Matégot’s production around 1960 : lyrical, playing with transparency, using all the technical expertise of the weavers (colour shading and grading…) Its evocative title is a reminder of the artist’s interest for aquatic subjects  (cf “Régates”) treated in an abstract-metaphorical way.   Bibliography : Exhibition Cat. Les tapisseries de Mathieu Matégot, galerie La Demeure, 1962 (ill.) Exhibition catalogue, Matégot, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1990-1991
  • Le soleil de Tijuana (the Tijuana sun)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. Signed certificate of origin. Circa 1960.   Matégot, originally a decorator, then creator of artefacts and furniture (an activity he abandoned in 1959) met François Tabard in 1945 and gave him his first cartoons, first of all figurative then rapidly of abstract design in the 1950’s. He became a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres Cartonniers de Tapisserie) in 1949, participated in many international exhibitions (Matégot, like Lurçat before him, was an untiring advocate of the art of tapestry) fulfilled numerous public commissions, sometimes of monumental proportions (“Rouen” 85m2 for the Préfecture of the Seine Maritime département, and also tapestries for Orly Airport, for the Maison de la Radio, for the IMF...) and designed no fewer than 629 cartoons up until the 1970’s. In 1990 the Matégot foundation for contemporary tapestry was inaugurated in Bethesda, U.S.A. Matégot is an artist, like Wogensky, Tourlière or Prassinos, who turns wool textiles resolutely towards the abstract: at first lyrical, geometric in the 70’s, exploiting various technical aspects of the loom : colour graduations, shading, irregularities...   Matégot, recognised as an avant garde designer, an admired creator of furniture and decorative objects, also produced an essentially abstract body of tapestry work. However this is not an example of pure abstraction : but rather the evocation of a place (there are also “Mindanao”, “Santa Barbara”....) of its climate, using all the technical means offered by the medium : transparency, graduations, shading...   Origin : contents of the Pinton workshop   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue, Matégot, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1990-1991
  • Ombres et lumières (light and shadow)

        Aubusson tapestry woven in the Pinton workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist. Circa 1965.     Matégot, originally a decorator, then creator of artefacts and furniture (an activity he abandoned in 1959) met François Tabard in 1945 and gave him his first cartoons, first of all figurative then rapidly of abstract design in the 1950’s. He became a member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres Cartonniers de Tapisserie) in 1949, participated in many international exhibitions (Matégot, like Lurçat before him, was an untiring advocate of the art of tapestry) fulfilled numerous public commissions, sometimes of monumental proportions (“Rouen” 85m2 for the Préfecture of the Seine Maritime département, and also tapestries for Orly Airport, for the Maison de la Radio, for the IMF...) and designed no fewer than 629 cartoons up until the 1970’s. In 1990 the Matégot foundation for contemporary tapestry was inaugurated in Bethesda, U.S.A. Matégot is an artist, like Wogensky, Tourlière or Prassinos, who turns wool textiles resolutely towards the abstract: at first lyrical, geometric in the 70’s, exploiting various technical aspects of the loom : colour graduations, shading, irregularities...   This tapestry reveals Matégot’s preoccupation with the interplay of light and shadow which is often revealed in the titles of his works (cf. “Lumière d’été”, auctioned Millon-Robert 7.11.90, n° 31, reproduced on the cover of the catalogue, “Piège de lumière” preserved at the Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine and reproduced p 47 of the exhibition catalogue). Here the cartoon uses an abrupt contrast, like a ray of light, between two opaque (with faults however) and black (but shaded) blocks. In fact all of Matégot’s works reveal the interplay of transparency and superposition, as if light (albeit fatal to the colours he uses) was trying to force its way through the wool.   Origin : contents of the Pinton workshop   Bibliography : Exhibition catalogue, Matégot, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1990-1991
  • Papillons de cocagne (ideal butterflies)

        Aubusson tapestry, woven in the Picaud workshop. Complete with certificate of origin signed by the artist. Circa 1970.       Michèle Van Hout le Beau designed numerous cartoons in the 1960’s and 70’s, working in collaboration with several workshops in Aubusson and receiving some state commissions (she participated along with Soulages, Lagrange, Alechinsky and others  in the decoration of the transatlantic Boeing 707’s for Air France). Her style often involves the use of strident colours (very evocative of the 1970’s) from which emerge foliage, stylised human or animal figures.   This cartoon, with its acidic colours is particularly characteristic of the artist’s style ; here we can also observe, on a theme abundantly developed by Lurçat, the different way in which the butterflies are evoked : the subject is here a pretext for highly coloured, geometrical evocations approaching abstraction.

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