small woodland harp
Aubusson tapestry woven by the Picaud workshop.
With its selvedge signed by the artist's wife, no. 3/6.
Circa 1975.
Jean Picart le Doux was one of the leading figures in the revival of tapestry. His career began in 1943 when he created 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 APCT (Association of Tapestry Cartoon Painters) and soon after became a professor at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. The French government commissioned numerous cartoons from him, most of which were woven in Aubusson, and some at the Gobelins Manufactory: the most spectacular were for the University of Caen, the Théâtre du Mans, the ocean liner France, and the Prefecture of Creuse, among others. While Picart le Doux's designs are close to those of Lurçat, his sources of inspiration and themes are also similar, but in a more decorative than symbolic register, where celestial bodies (the sun, the moon, the stars…), elements, nature (wheat, vines, fish, birds…), man, texts,…. coexist.
This tapestry reproduces “The Harp of the Forests” from 1953 (Bruzeau no. 45). The link between music and nature is a recurring theme in Picart le Doux's work: his tapestries are often enlivened by birds, which stand out against the straight background of the strings.
A similar tapestry is held at the Lycée d'Aubusson.
Bibliography:
Maurice Bruzeau, Jean Picart le Doux, Murs de soleil, Editions Cercle d'art, 1972
; Exhibition catalog: Jean Picart le Doux Tapestries, Municipal Museum of Art and History, Saint-Denis, 1976
; Exhibition catalog: Jean Picart le Doux, Postal Museum, 1980
; Exhibition catalog: The Music Room, Church of the Castle, Felletin, 2002, ill. p. 54
