Jean-René Sautour-Gaillard

A student of Wogensky’s at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Appliqués, Sautour-Gaillard had his first design woven in 1971 by the Legoueix workshop (a collaboration that continued thereafter), and he went on to produce a series of monumental projects, the most spectacular of which was ‘Pour un certain idéal’, a series of 17 tapestries on the theme of the Olympic Games (now held at the Museum of the Olympic Movement in Lausanne). Initially drawn to lyrical abstraction, in the 1990s the artist produced designs based on assemblages of decorative motifs, textures and figures, seemingly superimposed and unified in the weaving process.

‘La voix du reliquaire’ bears witness to the artist’s early affinity with the lyrical abstraction of artists such as Soulages and Schneider. We find, transposed into wool, the effects of gestures – and even drips – characteristic of the artists of the ‘lyrical flight’ movement, rendered in an extremely limited colour palette.

Bibliography:
D. Cavelier, Jean-René Sautour-Gaillard, La déchirure, Lelivredart, 2013, reproduced on p. 163