I was bowled over by the Pierre Soulages exhibition. As I had the gallery virtually to myself for nearly an hour, I could walk around the paintings - or rather look at them from either side. There was no way that I could convince Laurent later in the afternoon that « The Shades of Black" are full of different images.
(Soulages was born in 1952, studied art history in Munich and received his PhD in 1983. After stints at the National Museums in Munich, the Berlinische Galerie for twentieth-century art and the Städtisches Kunstmuseum Bonn, he has worked since 1991 as the curator of nineteenth and twentieth-century painting and sculpture at the Museum Folkwang in Essen. He is also a lecturer in art history in Bonn and Düsseldorf.)
This is all I could find in English on Internet so I suppose he helped to curate the exhibition at the gallery.
He was born in Rodez, Aveyron, in 1919 and is also is known as "the painter of black" because of his interest in the colour,
"...both a colour and a non-colour. When light is reflected on black, it transforms and transmutes it. It opens up a mental field all of its own".
He sees light as a matter to work with; striations of the black surface of his paintings enable him to make the light reflect, allowing the black to come out from darkness and into brightness, thereby becoming a luminous colour.
Still Laurent would not believe me. I tried. Jerome seemed to agree.
The paintings on show were all done from 2013 to 2015. Absolutely remarkable for a man of 96. I watched a little of the video when he was talking about his work. There was more energy in that than many people I know today. Our President calls him « The greatest painter alive of the 20th century ». I would add, « one of the greatest »…..
The black is light and sure enough when you turn around the paintings, rather like an animal preying on his « dinner to be » there are so many different lights, forms, brush strokes to see. How could you not like his work? Oh well, it’s a good thing that it takes all sorts to make up our world…..
I’ll get to Rodez to visit his museum one day. It’s just such a hassle to get there. But I will !
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| Front |
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| Side - 2015 |
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| 2014 |
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| 2015 |
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| another angle |
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| 2014 - you see the blue when you walk "in" |
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| 2014 - the above |
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| 2015 from th side |
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| front on |
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| 2014 |
Matter of Light » to quote Mario-Andreas von Lüttichau
Commentaires
I first saw Soulages at the Tate Gallery in 1964 at the famous exhibition 'Painting & Sculpture of a Decade'. Every major artist in the world was represented at that exhibition. Certain artists stood out for me. One was Soulages. I was drawn to the boldness and minimalism of his images.