Savin Maurice

    A versatile artist (engraver, medalist, ceramist, fresco painter...), Savin was solicited during the war by Guillaume Janneau, who admired the timeless and realistic monumentality of his aesthetic (and suspected that it would not need transposition to suit Tapestry), to design cartoons for the National Manufactures: "the pleasures and rural works" (4 cartoons), then "the 12 months of the year" were created simultaneously with his work with the Compagnie des Arts Français. The influence of the technical aspects of medieval tapestry is very strong in the artist, attentive to natural dyes in a reduced range, to simple forms allowed by the technique of the large stitch,... He was one of the most represented artists at the seminal exhibition of 1946, with 7 pieces (only Lurçat, Saint-Saëns and Gromaire had more). "The harvest" is contemporary with the cartoon designed for the Gobelins: "The apple harvest", from the tapestry on "the pleasures and rural works". We find the same characteristics specific to the artist: limited but vivid chromatic range, simplified and monumental forms, density of the composition, and a rustic flavor straight from medieval tapestry. Bibliography: Cat. Expo. French tapestry from the Middle Ages to the present day, 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 1st half of the 20th century, Beauvais, Galerie nationale de la Tapisserie, 1999^era half of the 20th century, Beauvais, National Gallery of Tapestry, 1999