Nice neighbours...

Just before Christmas I had a nice message from one of my clients in Germany : Kuball and Kempe.

They had bought a folding screen a couple of years ago and in April they  had ordered one  on the "Singerie" theme.
I did a few sketches , sent them and after a couple of changes we agreed on the composition.
I suppose that some people from Condé Nast visited their gorgeous shop and liked the screen.
They decided to have it as a  background to the nice  Xmas card they did for their clients.
Here it is .
 Scarf by Hermes, fabric by Chanel ...and my little screen ...and the donkey!

A few more pictures...

The Mix .

I do not know how I came up with this idea . But does anyone really know how ideas suddenly appear in our minds. I remember that I was searching something "new" for a show in Bergamo , an exhibition that took place in Palazzo Moroni ( at the same time as Salon in 2009). I was working with William Cochran in the US and one evening in my hotel room this "idea" of mixing up ornaments, preferably sketchy ones, quite loosely painted with waterbased technique and "central images" painted realistically in oils came to me. I did a few quick sketches , I thought it was a cool idea.
Did I really find someting or did I help memories to come back to the surface of my consciousness? This idea is certainly not new , others have done it before me ( I have seen this afterwards) but when this happened I really thought this mix was original...here are the results. These are paintings I did a few years ago but I still love them.
 I love  the art of painting per se. I feel grateful towards all the artists of the past who where strong enough to deal with the Beauty of the world and so talented that they added to it... I am impressed by all the artists of our time who dare do the same  . I have been given the gift of painting too and I try my best.

" Liz" , a mix of Renaissance ornaments and detail of a painting of F.Clouet , XVIth century.

Detail

"Grenades", a mix of a late XVIIIth century fabric and a still life of Chardin.

Detail

"Mop", a mix of images from "Marie-Antoinette" by S.Coppola ( I just changed the dog) and a Renaissance ornament.

Detail

"Orta", a mix of an ornament by Berain and a landscape of Corot.

Detail

"Grappa", a mix of a Louis XVI ornament and a detail of a dutch still life of the XVIIth century.

Detail

"Champagne", a mix of a "Regence" ornament and a picture of "Marie-Antoinette" by S.Coppola.

Detail

Chinoiseries I

The taste for designs and ornaments inspired by Chinese models started up in Europe in the XVIIth century, in England and the Netherlands first. These countries had indeed already established, at that time, strong and steady business relationships with the East.
It came to France a little later and really became a trend in the beginning of the XVIIIth century. This fashion gave birth to the most charming things, whether it be painted furnitures, fabric designs, paintings, tapestries and the like.
Chinoiserie designs were showing the everlasting seduction of exoticism but also expressed a real  admiration for chinese arts as well as for some aspects of chinese philosophy and society.

I created a "chinoiseries" collection for a Maison et Objet show a few years ago and ever since then I have orders for such designs. It is fun painting, full of charm and humor ; it is a nice playground for fantasy, nice color harmonies and strange vegetal forms...


Here is a version of a panel by A.Peyrotte. Casein on canvas ( approx. 210x100cm)

Pagode II

This another verison, the first I painted in fact, of the same design, on paper ( approx 180x75cm)

Pagode I

Here is now a series of paintings after the chinoiseries cartoons of F.Boucher.

Cipango I (150x85cm)

details on the face, before the aging proceses.

Cipango II (150x85cm)

Tian Shan ( 200x130cm)


The famous Giandomenico Tiepolo also painted a couple fo chinoiseries that I worked from in the following paintings

The next one is from a french ornemanist , Pillement.

Fleurs de chine ( 196x112cm)

and this very last panel is freely inspired and composed afer different designs of Pillement.

Rouge Orient ( 170x110cm)

Painting for "Au Soli"

Nearby our new home, in Megeve, one of the most  famous ski resorts of the Alps there is a nice shop, in the center of the village. It is called " Au Soli" (" in the sun" ...reminds me of " At Solsidan" by Carl Larsson).
The owner, one of the most passionate persons I know is a master cabinet-maker and a pure lover of the crafts of our mountains. He is a sort of scholar, incredibly knowleadgeable when it comes to the Alps, their traditions, crafts, history. His shop is a marvellous place that reflects his curiosity, his taste and the energy he puts in his work.
He found me at Maison et Objet a few years ago and ordered me a beautiful folding screen with paintings inspired of A.Calame.

Last year I did several paintings for him.

First a relatively large panel inspired by two different posters of the 1920's and 40's.

Then he talked to me about a very special piece of furniture that he had managed to find in some remote area and copied in his workshop.

He suggested that I create an ornament for the inside of the body and some "golden age" mountain scenes with figures for the inside of the doors.

I must say that I  would not have had this idea, but  I trusted him...and I think it was the right thing to do... the mix is in fact very unsual but it works perfectly.

He also asked me if he could borrow one of the canvases he had seen in my studio when he visited me as I was working on this commission.

It has been installed in the shop he owns down in the valley.

This painting was some sort of exercise I did for the exhibition of Salon in Versailles two years ago.

The mountain in the background is the Mont Blanc, pretty much as  we can see it from home.

The two figures are "borrowed" to Van Honthorst, a dutch painter of the XVIIth century. 

In May, I also painted this little chest of drawers for him. 

I covered the whole thing with paper and painted an "academic" alpine landscape inspired by paintings of  A. Calame, one of the most talented romantic mountain painters ever.

And finally I also painted four more small panels in the same style as the first one in this post.

They are all inspired by 1950s italian and swiss advertizing posters for ski resorts.

I have sometimes copied them quite literally and some other times I have made changes , in the backgrounds particularly.

Here are three of them in the shop " Au Soli" in Megeve.

It is a pleasure, and a pride, to be able to coopoerate with inspiring people like this man.