American artist Alexander Calder is renowned for his aerial creations and spent a large part of his life in France. A coffee-table book published by Abrams and a retrospective at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts both look at the origins of the medium that Calder christened “mobile” on the advice of his friend Marcel Duchamp. Calder grew up between...
A new Berthe Morisot exhibition starting at the Barnes Collection in Philadelphia on October 21 has a strong flavor of rediscovery — or even resurrection — of a once prominent artist. Nobody could call the Impressionist painter Berthe Morisot an outsider. She was said to be descended on her mother’s side from the Rococo master Honoré Fragonard. Camille Corot encouraged...
A stone’s throw from the Louvre and the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, the Sennelier store has catered to the likes of Cézanne, Soutine, Picasso, Karl Lagerfeld, and Sempé. Since 1887, artists have come here to buy their colors that were once hand-milled to order in the workshop behind the store. Among its achievements, Sennelier has invented Helios Red, Cinnabar Green, and...
French landscape painter Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot was also a talented portrait artist and observer of the female form. This lesser-known part of his art is revealed in an exhibition opening on September 9 at the National Gallery of Art. Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (1796-1875) is best known as a master of landscape painting in the 19th century, and a transitional figure between the French Neoclassical tradition...
If you can’t make it to France this summer, take a tour of the French gardens in the Public Parks, Private Gardens: Paris to Provence exhibition featured in the Metropolitan Museum of Art through July 29. More than 150 works by painters like Matisse, Rousseau, Monet, and Cassatt outline the beginning of French gardening prestige at the turn of the...
An exhibition at the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia explores the influence of Pierre-Auguste Renoir, the painter, on his son Jean Renoir, the filmmaker. When American filmmaker Martin Scorsese was nine he was taken to see Jean Renoir’s film The River. About the same time — as he later recalled — he came across a postcard of Pierre-August Renoir’s painting of...
Paul Cézanne is not usually thought of as a portrait painter, but while portraiture was a limited by-product of his total output, it was still an integral aspect of his work. Cézanne's portraits will be the subject of an exhibition at the National Gallery of Art through July 1. The son of a banker who gave him an allowance, Cézanne never...[Subscriber]
Jean-Michel Othoniel is taking over the three floors of the Perrotin Gallery in Manhattan for his first solo exhibition in New York since 2012. Some 35 "monumental" works assembling pearls and expanses of translucent bricks will make up the installations on show until April 15, 2018. A giant pearl necklace hung in the stairwell leads up to the "tornado room."...
Fifty years after leaving the U.S. pop art scene, French painter Martial Raysse is showcasing his "Visages" exhibition at the Levy Gorvy Gallery in New York. "Coming back here is like visiting an old friend." At the age of 82, figurative painter Martial Raysse is back in the United States. In his role as one of the founding members of...
Two French people living in Wyoming share a passion for photography and horseback riding, and document the daily lives of cowboys in the American West. Eager to present their work to the world, the couple recently opened a gallery in the small town of Cody. Guillaume Beau de Loménie is the son of a banker, who grew up in Madagascar,...
New York photographer Steve Giovinco is renowned for his dusky landscapes, and has received funding from the French Ministry of Culture to document the consequences of global warming in the south of France. With his camera hung around his neck, Steve Giovinco is hot on the trail of environmental changes. The New York photographer has captured the destruction caused by...
While the French Impressionists are well known from many exhibitions across the years, the same is not true of their 18th century predecessors. In fact, Watteau, Fragonard, and many of their contemporaries are sometimes dismissed as merely decorative artists without the depth and complexity of later French painters and sculptors. That doesn’t mean that acquisitive American collectors didn’t include them...
After an acclaimed 4-month stint in Seattle, an exhibition chronicling the life and remarkable 44-year career of the famed French designer will open this Saturday, May 6, at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Yves Saint Laurent pioneered modern women’s wear with such designs as the safari jacket and Le Smoking. His willingness to borrow from menswear prompted many to view his creations...
American residencies funded by private foundations are giving French and other international artists a chance to devote themselves fully to their artistic projects. Thanks to the foundation headed up by art collector Eileen Kaminsky, French artist Laurence de Valmy, 43, was given a studio to work in for three months at the Mana Contemporary cultural center. The artistic organization founded...
A 29-year-old Frenchman shocked the New York art scene 100 years ago. Marcel Duchamp's Fountain, an icon of modern art, will be on display at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through December 3. Curator Matthew Affron talked to us about the exhibition. France-Amérique: What is your objective for the Marcel Duchamp and the Fountain Scandal exhibition? Matthew Affron: We wanted to showcase what may...
Ever since his first exhibition in the United States in the early 1900s, Matisse has continued to inspire artists across America. Until June 18, the Montclair Art Museum (New Jersey) is presenting an exhibition highlighting Matisse’s lasting impact on American modern art. France-Amérique had a chat with Chief Curator Gail Stavitsky to discuss the French painter’s far-reaching influence on American...
The Statue of Liberty is the most famous French statue in the United States, but almost 20,000 other French creations also dot the country in places as diverse as Philadelphia, Honolulu, and Duluth in Minnesota. This collection piqued the curiosity of Laure de Margerie, a former documentarist from the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, and inspired her to create an online...
Founded by two French expats in Miami, the association French Arts Associates brings together French art professionals based in the United States. French Arts Associates was launched on November 18, 2016, with an inaugural event in the gallery owned by Parisian-born Lélia Mordoch in Wynwood — the Miami neighborhood hosting the Art Basel fair every year. The association founded by Sophie Blachet...
Jean Dubuffet (1935-1962) was a pioneer of "art brut", and is “the most renowned French artist in the United States” along with Yves Klein, according to collector Franck Prazan. Around 100 of Dubuffet’s drawings from French and American collections will be exhibited at the Morgan Library in New York from September 20 to December 2 of this year. Dubuffet influenced...[Subscriber]
An exhibition chronicling the life and remarkable 44-year career of the famed French designer opened on Tuesday at the Seattle Art Museum. Yves Saint Laurent pioneered modern women’s wear with such designs as the safari jacket and Le Smoking. His willingness to borrow from menswear prompted many to view his creations as instruments of female empowerment. (Upon being refused entry...
The Catholic Church of France has increasingly called on the services of contemporary artists since the 1960’s, employing a mix of believers, atheists, French citizens and non-French nationals to carry out renovations and publically commissioned work. These projects offer the Church a modern, enlightened image, and give the artists an opportunity to work in a space seeped in symbolism and...[Subscriber]
