Brigitte Marionneau (born in 1958)
« LE NOIR EFFACE TOUT ARTIFICE.
SEULES COMPTENT LA LIGNE, LA FORME, LA MATIÈRE ET LA LUMIÈRE. »
( Black erases all artifice.
Only line, form, material and light count.)
At the age of 23, familiar with the foundations of Japanese culture and art, through the study of the Masamichi Noro method, a Japanese body art, Brigitte Marionneau decided to train in raku ceramics with Camille Virot.
Seven years later, she moved to the village of La Borne, the internationally renown crucible of contemporary stoneware in France and set up her own studio.
Seduced by the history of La Borne and its “Movement” created in the 1940s, her artistic approach gradually took root in this territory and its intellectual neighborhood and artistic filiations.
Today, she walks in the footsteps of her elders from La Borne, such as Lerat, Yves Mohy and Joulia. A sculptor’s approach concerned with highlighting the material without artifice, in the tension of volumes whose simplicity translates a quest for the essential.
In 2018, after 30 years in La Borne, she got herself back in movement, this time towards the peninsula of Guérande, in the south of Bretagne.
Patrick Braoudé (born in 1954)
Patrick Braoudé is an actor and a film maker. He notably directed ‘Génial mes parents divorcent’ (1990), ‘Neuf mois’ (1993), ‘Amour et confusions’ (1996), ‘Deuxième vie’ (1999), or ‘Iznogoud’ (2005).
However, Patrick Braoudé is fond of photography since his teenage days, but only decided to exhibit his clichés for the first time in 2013 in the Villerville festival.
‘As a film maker who likes to watch his contemporaries, I enjoy spending time on the beach: groups of friends gathered for a joyful moment, resting families, couples of lovers looking for some quality time, thinkers seeking solitude…
I photograph snapshots of these “spied” lives. Figures often seen from the back, sometimes masked or against the light … blurry beings, Chinese shadows, “ghosts”, or even mere patches of colours… With the peculiar light of Normandie that gives to the see its astonishing hues, from grey-green to Prussian blue, to the sand its yellow of a rare smoothness, to the sunshades and the beach paraphernalia their sunbathed radiance… A few photographs … like the storyboard for a movie.’ (Patrick Braoudé)
Patrick Braoudé offers us highly pictorial photographs, never retouched, he plays to give us the feeling of standing in front of an ‘impressionist’ painting, yet keeping the snapshot inherent to the photography… The effects are obtained during the shooting without any computer management afterwards.
‘It’s Digital Impressionism’ friendly said Claude Lelouch visiting the Deauville’s exhibition … with a touch of timelessness. Simple photographs of everyday happiness, blurred by the hotness of summer and the moisture of sea spray, where temperature is palpable.
Charlotte Perriand (1903-1999)
Admitted in 1920 in the Central Union for Decorative Arts, Charlotte Perriand completes her training by attending the architecture classes taught by Maurice Dufrène and by taking her habits in André Lothe’s workshop. She presents her first creations at the 1925 International Exhibition of Decorative and Industrial Arts held in Paris, and again at the Salon des Artistes Décorateurs in 1926. However, she has to wait until 1927 and the Autumn Salon to retain her contemporaries attention, and notably Le Corbusier’s, with her ‘Bar sous le toit’.
Seduced by the innovative and essentially functional aspects of the young lady’s creations, Le Corbusier makes Charlotte Perriand his official partner. For about 10 years, she is thus associated with the famous architect’s and his cousin Pierre Jeanneret’s works. Edited at the time by the Maison Thonet, the sets elaborated by the trio encounter considerable success, among which creations is the 1929 Chaise longue, delivered to the Maharaja of Indore’s palace in the 1930s. During the same period, Perriand gets involved in the creation of the Union of Modern Artists (UAM), bringing together young avant-garde designers, counting with Jean Puiforcat, René Herbst or Louis Sognot.
In 1937 Charlotte Perriand takes back her independence. Though she remains fond of metal, she then turns to the rural world to find inspiration and designs prototypes of tables made of a single piece of pure pinewood, later edited by Steph Simon in the 1950s. Her creations, brilliantly combining tradition and modernity, make a fine synthesis of her experiences and intuitions, especially increased during her trip to Japan where she is an invited art counsellor. In the meantime, joining the association ‘Formes Utiles’ (Utilitarian Forms) in the early 1950s, Perriand pursues her research to elaborate normalize storage sets with the aim to combine efficiency, economy of material and mind satisfaction. One of her greatest achievements is definitely the wood-and-plastic furniture set she designs with Jean Prouvé of the Houses of Tunisia and Mexico in Antony.
Widely recognized for her work, Charlotte Perriand is entrusted with the accommodation of many architecture projects, such as the Japanese ambassador’s house in Paris, the Air France office in London, or ‘Les Arcs’ ski resort in Chambéry, where she each time proved her inspired vision of spatial organization and ability to establish a dialogue with Nature.
Jean Prouvé (1901-1984)
Jean Prouvé was born in 1901 in Nancy. Son of painter Victor Prouvé, he is introduced and trained to metalworking at age 16 in Borderel and Robert’s factory, where he first develop a real taste for moulding matter. Back to Nancy, he opens his first workshop in 1924. He experiments with metal properties and try out new soldering and polishing techniques. Distancing himself from his contemporaries, Jean Prouvé prefers the use of bended metal sheets rather than tubes, generally combining them with wood. Giving up with the traditional sketchbook, his furniture is based on prototypes above all conceived to be functional and widely distributed.
Prouvé’s originality rapidly comes to be noted and his aesthetic with simple, tough and elegant lines, is highly appreciated. Between 1925 and 1930, the designer sees his commands multiplied and diversified. Working hand in hand with architects like Tony Garnier of Beaudouin et Lods, he participates to the interior design of hospitals and schools, for instance realizing furniture sets to equip the rooms at the Cité Universitaire of Nancy or those of Edouard Herriott Hospital in Lyon.
In Paris, Jean Prouvé meets Le Corbusier and Mallet-Stevens. In 1929, he gets involved in the creation of the Union of Modern Artists together with Charlotte Perriand, with whom he notably designs wood-and-plastic bookshelves for the Houses of Tunisia and Mexico in Antony. In Pouvé’s own perspective, industrialization in building-making must contribute to social progress. Consequently, far from limiting himself to furniture, he undertakes the development of prefabricated houses, which very conception as kits make them highly mobile; such as the BLPS house, 300 of which would later be commissioned by the French Ministry of Armies. In the meantime, in 1946, he creates the Maxéville workshops, where complete ranges of furniture are designed and distributed exclusively by Steph Simon in Paris.
Jean Prouvé leaves the Maxéville workshops seven years later to install his design office in Paris. He maintains numerous partnerships through the realization of several buildings and interior design projects, and teaches from 1957 to 1969 in the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers. In 1963 he receives the prestigious Auguste Perret Price from the International Union of Architects.
Gustavo Perez (born in 1950)
Born in Mexico City in 1950, Gustavo Peréz begins his training as a ceramist in 1971 in Mexico’s school of Design and Craftsmanship. Under the guidance of Felipe Bárcenas, he focuses on the use of the wheel in order to create both light and elegant forms, but also with the aim to render his pieces functional. Gustavo Peréz rapidly builds his own kiln and becomes a teacher where he once was a student. In 1980, he is the laureate of a two-year grant to the Sint Joost Academy of Breda in Netherlands, and is invited to practice his art in Sint Paulus Abdij workshop in Oosterhout. Back in Mexico in 1984, he creates his workshop ‘El Tomate’ in the Rancho Dos y Dos in Veracruz.
Gustavo Peréz’s pieces are fired at high temperatures. Cutting through the epidermis of his ceramics, he creates surface incision afterwards coloured with enamels, thus playing with optic effects.
Gustavo Peréz has been a resident artist in Shigaraki Institute of Ceramic Studies in Japan, in Kecskemét International Ceramic Studio in Hungary, and from 2007 to 2009 in the Manufacture of Sèvres. He has also been invited to teach classes in Germany, France, Spain, Chile, Argentina and Colombia. Since 1984, Gustavo Peréz is a member of the International Academy of Ceramic and sited on its council from 2006 to 2012. His creations have been displayed individually or collectively in the USA, in Europe, in Asia, or even in New Zealand. Of his most famous exhibitions are those held at the Museum of Modern Art and at the Bellas Artes Palace in Mexico City. His latest great exhibition ‘self-portrait’ took place in Xalapa in 2017, and displayed about 4500 ceramics of his production.
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