Jean Lurçat

The work of Lurçat is immense: however, it was his role in the renewal of the art of tapestry that earned him his place in posterity. From 1917 onward, he began with works on canvas; then, in the 1920s and 1930s, he would work with Marie Cuttoli. His first collaboration with the Gobelins dated from 1937, when he discovered simultaneously the Apocalypse tapestry of Angers, which definitively prompted him to devote himself to tapestry. He tackled technical questions first with François Tabard, and then, during his installation in Aubusson during the war, he defined his system: large point, counted tones, drawn Cartoons, Numbered. A gigantic production then began (more than 1000 Cartoons), amplified by his desire to bring along his painter friends, the creation of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) and the collaboration with the gallery La Demeure and Denise Majorel, and then by his role as an tireless promoter of the medium throughout the world. His woven work bears witness to an art of imagery specifically decorative, in a symbolic iconography that is very personal—cosmogonic (sun, planets, zodiac, the four elements…), stylized vegetal, and animal (goats, cocks, butterflies, chimeras…)—which stands out against a background with no perspective (deliberately removed from painting).

A gigantic production then began (more than 1000 Cartoons), amplified by his desire to bring along his painter friends, the creation of the A.P.C.T. (Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie) and the collaboration with the gallery La Demeure and Denise Majorel, and then by his role as an tireless promoter of the medium throughout the world.

His woven work bears witness to a specifically decorative artist-imaginer’s art, with a highly personal, symbolic and cosmogonic iconography (sun, planets, zodiac, the 4 elements…), stylized vegetal forms, and animals (goats, roosters, butterflies, chimeras…) set against a background with no perspective (deliberately distanced from painting). In his most ambitious Cartoons, it was intended to share both a poetic vision (he sometimes even intersperses these tapestries with quotations) and a philosophical one (the major themes were addressed from the war on: freedom, resistance, fraternity, truth…), culminating in the “Chant du Monde” (Musée Jean Lurçat, former Saint-Jean hospital, Angers), unfinished at his death.

This profile head of a rooster appears in various Cartoons (“Feux bleus”, “la chanson de Roland”, …): there it appears, with its mandorla, as if held in reserve, radiant, against the black ground. The title, moving from rooster to pheasant, allows a pun on “faire feu”.

Bibliography:
Tapestries by Jean Lurçat 1939–1957, Pierre Vorms Editeur, 1957
Exhibition cat. Lurçat, 10 years later, Musée d’Art moderne de la ville de Paris, 1976
Cat. Expo. Les domaines de Jean Lurçat, Angers, Musée Jean Lurçat et de la tapisserie contemporaine, 1986
Colloque Jean Lurçat et la renaissance de la tapisserie à Aubusson, Aubusson, Musée départemental de la Tapisserie, 1992
Exhibition cat. Dialogues with Lurçat, Musées de Basse-Normandie, 1992
Exhibition cat. Jean Lurçat, Donation Simone Lurçat, Académie des Beaux-Arts, 2004
Gérard Denizeau, Jean Lurçat, Liénart, 2013
Exhibition cat. Jean Lurçat au seul bruit du soleil, Paris, galerie des Gobelins, 2016