Saint Francis speaking to the animals
Aubusson tapestry woven by the Perathon workshop.
1938.
Jean Bazaine, like many of his contemporaries, has always pursued an intense activity related to mural art, in monumental works. Although he is best known as a designer of stained glass or mosaics, he also created cartoons for tapestries, from the late 1930s. These achievements fall within the framework of a renewal of sacred art, of which Bazaine, especially after the war, was one of the main protagonists.
Jean Bazaine directs with Abbot Morel (who will be one of the major players in the introduction of abstraction in churches), from 1936 to 1937, a painting workshop, from which, probably, concerns already advanced in the field of sacred art. Our cartoon, figurative (Bazaine abandons figuration during the war), with traditional iconography, is thus a modest testimony to the artist's first steps both in mural art and in sacred art.
