Produit Largeur 128 cm

Jean PICART LE DOUX

The open cage

Aubusson tapestry woven by the Berthaut workshop. With its ribbon signed by the artist. 1953.

Jean Picart le Doux was one of the leading figures in the revival of tapestry. He began working in this field in 1943, creating cartoons for the ocean liner La Marseillaise. Close to Lurçat, whose theories he embraced (limited tones, numbered cartoons, etc.), he was a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-cartonniers de Tapisserie) and soon became a professor at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The state commissioned him to produce numerous cartoons, most of which were woven in Aubusson, and some at Les Gobelins: the most spectacular were for the University of Caen, the Théâtre du Mans, the ocean liner France, and the Prefecture of Creuse. While Picart le Doux's designs were similar to those of Lurçat, his sources of inspiration and themes were also similar, but in a more decorative than symbolic register, combining the stars (the sun, moon, stars, etc.), the elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds, etc.), man, texts, etc. Birds are a recurring motif in the artist's work in the first half of the 1950s, as are the sparks punctuated with dots around the edge of the cage. Furthermore, the limited color palette is reminiscent of traditional greenery. Bibliography: Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d'art, 1972 Cat. Exp. Jean Picart le Doux, Musée de la Poste, 1980

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Jean Lurçat

Fire pheasant

Aubusson tapestry woven by the Tabard workshop. With its bolduc signed by the artist. Circa 1960.

Lurçat's body of work is immense, but it is his role in the revival of the art of tapestry that has ensured his place in history. He began working with canvas in 1917, then collaborated with Marie Cuttoli in the 1920s and 1930s. His first collaboration with Les Gobelins dates back to 1937, when he discovered the Apocalypse tapestry in Angers, which inspired him to devote himself entirely to tapestry. He first tackled the technical issues with François Tabard, then, when he moved to Aubusson during the war, he defined his own system: large stitches, counted tones, numbered cartoons. A huge production then began (more than 1,000 cartoons), amplified by his desire to involve his painter friends, the creation of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) and his collaboration with the La Demeure gallery and Denise Majorel, then by his role as a tireless promoter of the medium throughout the world. His woven work bears witness to a specifically decorative art of imagery, in a highly personal, cosmogonic symbolic iconography (sun, planets, zodiac, four elements, etc.), stylized plants, animals (goats, roosters, butterflies, chimeras, etc.), stand out against a background without perspective (deliberately distanced from painting) and, in his most ambitious cartoons, are intended to share a vision that is both poetic (he sometimes embellishes these tapestries with quotations) and philosophical (the major themes were addressed as early as the war: freedom, resistance, fraternity, truth, etc.) and whose culmination was to be the "Chant du Monde" (Jean Lurçat Museum, former Saint-Jean Hospital, Angers), which was unfinished at the time of his death. This rooster's head in profile appears in various cartoons ("Feux bleus," "La chanson de Roland," etc.): it appears there, with its mandorla, as if in reserve, radiant against the black background. The title, changing from rooster to pheasant, allows for a play on words on "faire feu" (to fire). Bibliography: Tapisseries de Jean Lurçat 1939-1957, Pierre Vorms Editeur, 1957 Exhibition catalog: Lurçat, 10 ans après, Musée d'Art moderne de la ville de Paris, 1976 Exhibition catalog: 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, Simone Lurçat Donation, Academy of Fine Arts, 2004 Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013 Exhibition catalog Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil (Jean Lurçat to the Sound of the Sun Alone), Paris, Galerie des Gobelins, 2016

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André BORDERIE

Rock flower

Aubusson tapestry woven by the Legoueix workshop. No. 2/4. Circa 1970.

Initially a sculptor who used a wide variety of materials (steel, concrete, ceramics, etc.), Borderie discovered a passion for tapestry in the 1950s, weaving his first cartoon in 1957. Encouraged by Denise Majorel, he was awarded the Grand Prix National de la Tapisserie in 1962. In 1974, he was appointed director of the Ecole Nationale des Arts Décoratifs d'Aubusson, from which he resigned very quickly. He produced nearly 500 painted cartoons, abstract, with simple shapes, graded in a reduced color range, with large-stitch weaves. Dynamic abstraction, a color palette ranging from orange to brown, abstract designs playing on the plastic effects of light through colors: a classic André Borderie design. Bibliography: Cat. Expo. André Borderie "pour l'homme simplement" (Simply for Man), Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine, 1998 J.J. and B. Wattel, André Borderie et la tapisserie d'Aubusson (André Borderie and Aubusson Tapestry), Editions Louvre Victoire, 2018, reproduced on p.22

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Hélène CHAMPALOUX

Portrait

Aubusson tapestry woven by the Pinton workshop. With its ribbon, no. 1/6. Circa 1980.

Undoubtedly a tapestry woven based on a work by Hélène Champaloux (with an X!), in a style reminiscent of 1970s posters, with a solarized face: a rarity in tapestry!