The dazzled eye
Tapestry woven by the Clochard workshop.
With its bolduc Signed by the artist, No. 1/6.
Circa 1980.
Engraver by training (Prix de Rome for engraving in 1942), Jean Louis Viard made his first cartoons in the mid-1950s. First figurative (he then worked with Picart Le Doux), he subsequently followed the natural path of many painter-cartoonists (the same as Matégot, Tourlière, or Prassinos, …), evolving toward abstraction. He created dozens of cartoons up until the 2000s, in parallel with his work as a painter and engraver, while showing particular interest in materials and textures, in the manner of the proponents of the “New Tapestry,” of which Pierre Daquin—who wove the work—was one of the major figures.
His themes, sometimes metaphysical (“Mémoires,” “Destins,” …), ranged widely—from astronomical infinity (“solar darkness”) to cellular minuteness (“Végétal Mutation”): a profuse and varied body of work overall, regularly exhibited at La Demeure, in various salons or special exhibitions, and more significantly at the Comparaison salon, for which he was responsible for the Tapestries section.
