The Lute and the Doves
Aubusson tapestry woven by the Berthaut workshop.
With its label signed by the artist, No. 6/8.
Circa 1955.
Jean Picart le Doux is one of the major figures in the revival of tapestry. His beginnings in the field date back to 1943: he created cartoons for the liner 'la Marseillaise'. Close to Lurçat, whose theories he adopted (limited tones, numbered cartoons,…), he is a founding member of the A.P.C.T. (Association of Cartoonists-Tapestry Artists) and soon became a professor at the National Higher School of Decorative Arts. The State commissioned numerous cartoons from him, most of which were woven in Aubusson, and some at the Gobelins: the most spectacular ones were for the University of Caen, the Mans Theatre, the France liner, or the Creuse Prefecture,…. If Picart le Doux's conceptions are close to those of Lurçat, his sources of inspiration and themes are also similar, but in a more decorative than symbolic register, where stars (the sun, the moon, the stars…), elements, nature (wheat, vine, fish, birds…), man, and texts coexist,….
“The lute and the doves” takes up a more dense and vast cartoon from 1949, “the birds take flight”, supposed to symbolize the Liberation, a theme found in “the open cage” from 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, Cercle d'art Editions, 1972
Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, tapisseries, Saint-Denis, Musée, 1976
Exhibition catalogue Jean Picart le Doux, Paris, Musée de la Poste, 1980
