Next to the exhibition "The Water Lilies of Olivier Debré", Eric de Chassey, Director of INHA gave a lecture at the Contemporary Creation Center Olivier Debré this Thursday, September 27, 2018. Introduction to the history of the abstraction of Twentieth century, this meeting tended to highlight the conceptual relationship between the leader of Impressionism and Olivier Debré also invoking abstract expressionism, through the inevitable Jackson Pollock.
The history of contemporary abstraction draws its inspiration from the late works of C. Monet, the latter contemplating Nature at Giverny, freeing himself from a realistic reading of his gardens. The sensory revelations which C. Monnet will endeavor to paint in his last Nympheas sign the beginnings of a new movement: abstraction. It was by reading an article in the Life 2 review, published in December 1957 and subtitled Old Master's Modern Heirs, that Eric de Chassey illustrated the ties of filiation between Olivier Debré, Jackson Pollock and the famous Water Lilies painter.
After the second world war, Paris was no longer the capital of modern art, this new hegemony returning to the city of New York. Claude Monet is then rediscovered by the American painters of the new generation. Art critics such as Clément Greenberg then approached the sensory materializations of C. Monet to the pictorial techniques of Jackson Pollock's "all over". Gradually abolishing the representation of the subject in favor of a pure expression of his emotions in the face of Nature, the painter of the Nymphéas will inspire the painters of abstract expressionism by opening the way to a  l

new plasticity. "I do not need to imitate Nature, I am Nature", such is the statement of Jackson Pollock to define the pictorial revolution of his monumental frescoes. This relationship of influence between C. Monet and J. Pollock was built by the art critic Clément Greenberg. However, according to Erik de Chassey, he remains somewhat fictitious and manufactured.
Like Jackson Pollock, Olivier Debré explores the limits of the pictorial field as much as its materiality. Architect of training, he has in some way delocalized the Norman Water Lilies and redefined in his gestural abstraction of new water lilies Tourangelles. Affectionant Touraine, in its green setting, embedded in the tuffeau of the Loire Valley, he likes to make manifest the fluidity and liquidity of the banks of the Loire. The exhibition at the white gallery at Ccc od of six monumental canvases, entitled "The Water Lilies" by Olivier Debré follows a donation during the year 2016. They were commissioned in 1990 by Alain Julien Laferrière for the CCC. Four works were initially expected in the format of picture rails (400x900). Described as "Wall Painting", Olivier Debré's monumental canvases display by their density a notion of infinity that the light of color structures. Inverting the traditional notions of horizontality and verticality, Olivier Debré makes color the agent of reconstruction of the world. His pictorial frescoes reveal an existential presence with space. His work invites us to think gestural abstraction as another model for the real. This is perhaps one of the essential experimental contributions of Olivier Debré to contemporary art.
A frequent traveler, Olivier Debré has been nourished by light through his escapades in Black Africa, Mexico, China, Greece, Italy and Norway.
Elected member of the Academy in 1999, the various stage curtain creations of Olivier Debré will have marked the contemporary artistic collaborations. Responding to a public commission, Olivier Debré will perform the curtain of the Comédie Française, the Hong Kong Opera House and Shanghai, perpetuating his commitment to the creation of monumental works. (1000x1300cm)

 

 

The exhibition "Les Nymphéas" by Olivier Debré takes place until January 6th, 2019 at 

the Contemporary Creation Center Olivier Debré, François 1er Garden, 37000 Tours

 

 

Naïg Desmadriguen

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