La mort du lièvre (the hare’s death)
Aubusson tapestry woven by the Rivière des Borderies workshop.
1946.
Perrot began his career as a cartoon designer at the end of the war, making almost 500 cartoons including numerous commissions from the state, most of which were woven at Aubusson. His style which is particularly rich and decorative is eminently recognisable : a crowd of butterflies or birds, most often, stands out against a background of vegetation, reminiscent of the millefleurs tapestries (which would also inspire Dom Robert).
One of Perrot’s earliest tapestries, contemporary with ‘La chasse au renard’ (‘The Fox Hunt’) which featured in the seminal 1946 exhibition, our carton bears witness to Perrot’s early inspiration: a taste for Nature, animals, an interest in botany, geology and inhabited landscapes (man is absent here, but he lives in the village, he hunts)… The artist-ethnographer recycled in tapestry the observations made for the Museum of Popular Arts and Traditions during the war.
Bibliography :
Tapisseries, dessins, peintures, gravures de René Perrot, Dessein et Tolra, 1982, reproduced p.83
Cat. Expo. René Perrot, mon pauvre cœur est un hibou, Aubusson, Cité de la Tapisserie, 2023
