200 WORKS AND OVERWHELMING

mai 23, 2014

Opening New Contemporary Art Centre Francois Pinault 2009

He’s handsome, debonaire and doesn’t really look as if his work could be complex, ambiguous and with so many changing periods which bewildered me.   Martial Raysse.(1936-) It’s rather like Lucio Fontana - you say that name and it conjures up slits in paper. For me Raysse is pop art and I immediately see this.

Made in Japan but how about Ingres?

Made in Japan - La grande odalisque 196?

His strange women who all seem to be green - or many of them anyway and with many references to the Masters and the Renaissance or even earlier. Seeing a retrospective of his work was going to prove disconcerting as I couldn’t find the thread that was spoken about in various art reviews I receive regularly.

Many of his titles are "Madame" or Image and trying to find them on Internet was as complex as understanding his work - some are missing....

Back again my dear Master 2007

Springtime conversation 1964

A chronological thread which really has escaped art historians since Raysse came onto the scene in the 1960’s. That was the New Realist period - ladies on the beach, Raysse Beach which being so pop, they are acceptable. There is not one I would hang on a wall but because they belong to a period I know, I can relate to them without being part of them.

SUDDENLY LAST SUMMER 1963

REMEMBER TAHITI, 1963

Suddenly Last Summer (series)

Raysse Beach

Made in Japan (series)

This is a giddy experience. 50 years of an artist’s work and as it stands today, it seems, he is the most expensive French artist alive. Apparently even he felt a little overwhelmed a few days before the exhibition opened. Or perhaps curious rather than overwhelmed, as it was the first time he saw a full retrospective of his work.

The new Realist period, and I guess that’s what most people know him for, didn’t last for very long. He got sick of it but had to learn something else. From the 90’s onwards he seems to have become even more radical in his approach. The New Realist’s period was probably because of his friendship with Arman and his discovery of something new through Yves Klein and Cesar….artists who were working with anything that could be recuperated. Consumer goods…but I bet they drank a little more than milk. His girls no longer stay within a frame - everything goes further - nothing is ridged any longer….too idealistic - models who pose to perfection. He also said, that the Prisunic were modern art museums - I smile at that as Mother and I would visit « les petits musées » when we were down south. They just happened to be Ikea and supermarkets….

PRISUNIC DISPLAY 1960

In the States he opens up to neons. L.A. and Las Vegas, cinema but by 1968 he is back in France and is taking an active part in the events. This is when he feels that art has become « commercial » and « reactionary » (isn’t it today?) - so he tries his hand at films. Cynical, send ups of our commercial world. He was a hippie and I don’t doubt that for one moment. During this period he created a huge tent called "Oued Laou" - it’s strange to enter it. Nothing inspired me and yet I would think if one was high, the colors could dance all sorts of patterns.

Four Steps in the clouds 1966

The city of the Peaks, horrible painting 1965

Oued Laou, 1971

Four Neons for Alexandra 1967

America America 1964

Four Steps in the clouds 1966

Other series are developed - collages, assemblages - all very strange. Nicky who was with me pointed out on more than once that what we were looking at was a collage even if it was described as something else. Her finger traced it’s way around the lines which had been cut - an attendant became very nervous…..then Raysse seems to change again with his sculptures - some are rough, other smooth and longing to be caressed.

No, you shut up - Suzanna, Suzanna - Collage and montage

Nicky said "this is me" takes me a long time to go to bed and get up

Kasbah 1968

Tarata 1971

Image V, 1978

Tree

The Exchange 1978

Image .....

Série du Graal 1984

The Little House, the Chair 1979

Retrospective

Miss Tura 1994

Death Loves me 2003

Beloved Freedom 199?

The Surface of the Waters 2009

Little Beauty in a Shell 1998

The Wise Elise 1979

Sisphus and your sister 199?

Bread and wine 1986

Diane of the Wastelands 1989

Bacchus of Sainte-Terre 1997

Study for the Spring 1987

George and the Dragon 1990

Beloved liberty 2000

The seal of the first day 1987

Paintings which are strangely mythological with creatures appearing in their trees, or blessing the clouds….

The Friend of Clouds 1982

The Spring 1990

His portraits are psychedelic. What I found so strange were the different periods which seemed to be mixed up - or was I just mixed up in trying to follow his work?

About New York in peinturmama 1965

Miss Bagdad

FRANCE

High Tension painting 1965

PORTRAIT OF MRS V.d.K1962

BROKEN PICTURE 1964

BEAUTY OF THE CLOUDS 1965

Ajouter une légende

Marie Lou 1967

There you are cruel one 2010

Think of me often 2008

How are you doing Irma ? 2013

Kill me Yasmina 2010

I like a little of it - but frankly not too much. He’s an artist which I need to take in small doses. This was the opening and quite a few of the spectators were making « lost remarks » and were not too at ease with what they were looking at. We could even become a part of his work.