François FAUREAU

François Faureau's career is quite unique. Born in Aubusson, he attended the ENAD, then under the direction of Marius Martin, who already promoted thick weaving and counted tones that Lurçat would later adopt. Thus, he participated in the ENAD stand at the 1925 International Exposition of Decorative Arts as a cartoonist with the tapestry 'Solitude, verdure' or the screen 'Canards', which oscillate between a classicizing style and the influence of Cubism. He later had his own workshop, but his work remained confidential and distant from the protagonists of the 'Renaissance of Tapestry'.

If the workshops of Aubusson (like the National Manufactures) continued their activity under the occupation, the woven achievements subject to the injunctions of Art-Marshal remain rare, although this traditional know-how could respond to the values of the National Revolution. The famous formula pronounced from June 25, 1940 by Pétain (Emmanuel Berl being the pen), and become a Vichy leitmotif, exalting rurality, rooting, and, more prosaically, agriculture, is illustrated here in a literal and synthetic way: variety of work, vegetation, architectures, animals, ... flourishing under the aegis of the Vichy regime.

Provenance: Régine Deforges Collection

Bibliography:
Cat. Expo. Tapestries 1925, Aubusson, Cité de la tapisserie, 2012