Lefranc Bourgeois at the Museum Episode N°3: Sculpting light
LEFRANC BOURGEOIS AT MONTPELLIER'S FABRE MUSEUM
The Lefranc Bourgeois series at the Musée Fabre in Montpellier draws to a close. Having explored the Impressionist movement in the previous episode, let's now dive into a captivating final installment.
Discover how Monet, over time, moved towards abstraction, a major transition that would later influence artists such as Soulages. This rich and exciting final episode reveals the links between these two masters from different eras.
SEE EPISODE N°3
MONET AND THE BEGINNINGS OF MONOCHROME
Monet's Water Lilies series, comprising some 250 oil paintings, depicts the flower garden and, more specifically, the water lily pond at the artist's residence in Giverny. Monet had a marked preference for outdoor representations, exploiting the play of light.
Over time, Monet simplified his motifs and moved towards an increasingly monochrome technique. This gradual transformation is reflected in his paintings, heralding the arrival of abstraction and influencing many twentieth-century artists, including painter Pierre Soulages.
THE MASTER OF BLACK, PIERRE SOULAGES
The Musée Fabre houses the most extensive collection of paintings by Pierre Soulages, the key French artist associated with abstract art since the late 1940s. In his work, light plays a predominant role, reflecting off the surface. A true sculptor of light, Soulages innovates by creating his own tools for scratching, removing and smoothing paint.
He explores the color black in his works, which he describes as outrenoir from 1979 onwards.
OUTRENOIR
The "Outrenoir" series by Soulages is made up of large paintings covered in flat blacks that play with light. The succession and accumulation of gestures creates an appearance or disappearance of light.
Pierre Soulages sculpts matter with effects of transparency and opacity. Transparency allows light to exist from behind, while opacity allows light to settle on the surface of the painting.
MARCH BLACK
Mars black is a black that veers very slightly towards red. In alchemical lexicon, the name "Mars" symbolizes iron and the color orange. It's an opaque color that dries quickly. This black allowed Soulages to play with light thanks to its reflections and warm tones.
Combining this black with a medium allows you to sculpt light.
SCULPTING MATTER WITH THE EMPATEMENT MEDIUM
While the fluidity of the paint allows for transparent effects, some painters seek to add volume to their material. By mixing this medium with oil, it becomes possible to work in relief without fear of sagging.
Lefranc Bourgeois Impasto Medium offers a unique way to enrich texture, while preserving the color stability and pigment intensity of our oil paint range. This dense paste, designed to thicken and stiffen oils, is ideal for creating impasto.
