Charlotte Perriand exhibit

Monday October 21 turned out to be a mainly sunny day with a high of about 16C.  Very nice change.

We stopped for a coffee at Le Boot, a tiny place in the Marais.  Paris has only started serving good coffee over the past few years.  This place was using beans from Oslo.

Le Boot

Alain with his macchiato

We wandered around the Marais a bit more, although a number of stores were closed on Monday.

Hello handsome!

We stopped at Maison Labiche, a store that does embroidery on T-shirts, sweaters, coats etc. in a unique handwriting.  I got a red-striped T-shirt that says "Moi, non plus."   They also do custom embroidery.

Wrapping my t-shirt

Great selection

We made a stop at Chez Marianne to pick up a poppy seed and apple cake square for the apartment.  Our favourite place on Rue de Rosiers is closed this week for holidays.

Poppy seed and other cake squares

Next we stopped at Grom, one of our favourite gelato/sorbetto places in Italy, which has branches in Paris and NYC.

We got chocolate extraordinaire (sorbetto) pour moi and pistachio for Alain.

 We then took the Metro from Hôtel de Ville, where there was a wonderful display of the colourful photos by Hassan Hajjaj, which we had seen last week.

The Metro system invited Hassan Hajjaj to display his pictures.  

His work is so colourful and playful, celebrating Moroccan culture.

We took the Metro to the 16th arrondissement to see the fabulous exhibit Le monte nouveau de Charlotte Perrriand (Charlotte Perriand: Inventing a New World)  at the Fondation Louis Vuitton.

We passed some beautiful apartments en route

Very fancy digs near the Bois de Boulogne

The Fondation is housed in a wonderful building designed by Frank Gehry.  It opened in 2014.   Gehry had said "I dream of designing a magnificent vessel for Paris that symbolises France's profound cultural vocation".  It is a gorgeous building located in the beautiful Bois de Boulogne.

Fondation Louis Vuitton- Frank Gehry building

Poster outside the Museum

Inside of museum

Charlotte Perriand (1903-99) was a pioneer of modernity, a leading figure of 20th century design who  had a vision of the "synthesis of the arts."  To mark the 20th anniversary of her death, the Fondation pays tribute to her as an architect and visionary creator through an exhibit of her work which explores the links between art, architecture and design.  There are also incredible works by her friends Fernand Léger, Pablo Picasso and Alexander Calder.

Perriand was born on October 24, 1903 in Paris.  She studied at the École de l'Union Centrale des Art Décoratifs from 1920-25.  Two years later, she began working as an interior designer, based at her studio on Place Saint-Sulpice.  Her research and interest in furniture design led her to collaborate with Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret in the 1920s and 1930s.

Parriand had a broad vision of her own practice.  Her aim was to improve daily life and she proposed a synthesis of architecture with the other arts (painting, sculpture, photography, etc.).

Pierre Jeanneret (1896-1967) Charlotte Perriand with Le Corbusier's hands holding a plate like a halo in the Saint-Sulpice studio

In the first room of the exhibit, the furniture, paintings and sculpture and tapestries reflected Perriand's desire to synthesize the arts.

In 1956, Perrriand was asked to do the furnishings for the Musée National d'Art Moderne in Paris.  Picasso's Women at the sea was one of the works she chose to accompany her proposals.

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) Women at the sea 1956

Perriand- Ombre chair, 1954 and Stackable table (designed in May 1953), in front of Calder (1898-1976) Black, blue, red 1954

Perriand, Le Corbusier (1887-1965), Pierre Jeanneret- Adjustable Reclining Chair, 1928-- designed by Perriand in 1928- Perriand, Swivel armchair, 1927 (created for her Saint-Sulpice studio) in front of Léger Power Transmission, 1937, a monumental painting, executed by students in his studio for the Palais de la Découverte at the 1937 Exposition Internationale (his conception of Progress during the 1930s- in keeping with the aspirations of the Popular Front-included humanity's control over nature through technological progress, and mural art accessible to everyone).

At the end of the 1920s, Perriand imagined an 'art of living' that broke with the codes of the time.  In 1927, for her Parisian studio at Saint-Sulpice, she used stainless steel to make incredibly modern furniture.

Pierre Jeanneret, Charlotte Perriand and Le Corbusier in the opening of the window of the "Bar under the roof", Place Saint-Sulpice 1928

Léger, Woman with red background. Sitting Woman 1926

Picasso, Dora Maar at the beach, 1936

Perriand and Alfred Roth, Saint-Sulpice square, 1928
(note: Perriand often wore a necklace she made of chromed copper balls, a symbol of her adherence to the 20th century machine age)

In 1927, Perriand moved into a former photographer's studio.  She made her home a laboratory of forms.  Her Bar sous le Toit (Bar under the roof), was shown at the 1927 Salon d'Automne and her diving room at the Salon des artistes Décorateurs in 1928.

One of her most remarkable innovations was the extendable table that could accommodate up to 11 guests.  The accompanying stools and chairs were included in the series of furniture Thonet began producing in 1930, under the names of Le Corbusier, Jeanneret, and Perriand.

Bar under the roof and the Saint-Sulpice studio's dining room, 1927, published in Intérieurs, 1929

Extendable table, Swivel armchair, Swivel stool, 1927

The Adjustable Reclining Chair (1928) was very comfortable-- beside a beautiful credenza) 

So modern-- a wonderful piece

Perriand- Production plan for the Very comfortable armchair, large model, 1928

Interior design of a dwelling, Salon d'Automne 1929

Perriand, René Herbst and Louis Sognot designed a 63 metre studio as the House for a Young Man, International Exposition, 1935.  The exhibit reconstructed the study and exercise room, including the immense painting done by Léger at Perriand's request.

Picture from the original show

Reconstruction at the exhibit

Picture of exercise room

Léger painting in the exercise room (there were ropes for exercise hanging beside the picture )
Project for the decoration of an exercise room, 1935

In 1929, Perriand became one of the cofounders of the Union des Artistes Moderne (UAM), which claimed that "modern art is a truly social art.  A pure art, accessible to all."   Perrriand was politically active in the 1930s.  She joined the Association of revolutionary writers and artists in 1932.  She advocated for the Spanish Republicans and with Léger for France's left-wing alliance, the Front Populaire.

Perriand, Poverty-stricken Paris, 1936, with the participation of Jean Bossu, Emile  Enci,
Jacques Wong and George Pollack

The coffee table (below) for the small living room adjacent to Jean-Richard Bloch's office, was a manifesto of the writer's antifascist commitment and his crusade for the arts.  Block was the editor of the Communist newspaper Ce soir, and a defender of avant-garde artists.  On the top of the table, Perriand embedded prints of two vignettes from Picasso's Dream and Lie of Franco, the satire of the dictator Picasso engraved shortly before painting Guernica.  Since the original has been lost,  the table at the Fondation exhibit has been reconstructed from original plans and photographs.

Perriand, Léger, Picasso, Manifesto Table, 1937

Perriand, Boomerang desk for Jean-Richard Bloch, 1938 (Reproduction by Cassina (2019)

Joan Miró (1893-1983) 'Help Spain' poster, 1937

The next section of the exhibit dealt was entitled Inspired by Nature- "art brut" and "free forms", 1933-38.  In the early 1930's, Perriand was looking for "lessons from the laws of nature".  She and Léger and Jeanneret used to go to the Normany beaches and forage for pebbles and wood.  She photographed these pieces washed up from the sea.  Le Corbusier incorporated related subjects into his painting.  Léger drew stones, roots, bands and gloves.  

Perriand on the beach with a friend, c. 1932

Perriand, Pieces of wood washed up from the sea, flint, fish bone, 1933

Léger, Composition with tree trunks, 1933

Perriand, Vegetal installation in Charlotte Perriand's studio, 1969

Le Corbusier, Woodcutter, 1931

Perriand, Sandstone on the sand, Normandy beach, 1936

Perriand, Sheet of ice held aloft by two hands, last photo of Sandstone, all in the Fontainbleau forest, 1935
Hexagonal table, Montparnesse, 1938 - Perriand designed the table for her limited space of her apartment in Montparnesse.  Its shape is 'free' in harmony with her natural aesthetic that evolved in the 1930s.
It is made of untreated wood.

In February 1940, the Japanese government invited Perriand as an advisor on the production of industrial design in the country.  At that time, Japan was still neutral in the war.  She finished her mission some months before the beginning of the war, leaving for Indochina in 1942, where she was stranded for the rest of the war.

 In Japan, Parriand fell in love with the culture.  She travelled all over the country to give lectures.  In 1941, in Tokyo and Osaka, her exhibition A Contribution to the Interior Furnishings of a House, Selection, Tradition, Creation, synthesised her research and various projects.  She included local production.

Black and white rug with a motif transposed from a photograph of a sailor's chalk drawing, 1940 (based on a photograph taken by Perriand on the boat she took from Marseille to Kobe (June 15-Aug 21, 1940)

Méandre bench, 1937-40.  This bench was presented at the exhibition Selection, Tradition, Creation, at the Takashimaya department store in Tokyo.

When Perriand left for Japan, the General Director of Fine Arts, Georges Huisman, conferred on her a "mission to promote French art in Japan."  As part of this initiative, Léger gave her some 100 black and white photos of his major paintings and drawings.  Among them was Composition with two parrots.  Since she couldn't include the original at her 1941 exhibit in Osaka and Tokyo, she placed a black and white print, about three metres long, at the entrance to the show.

The work presented in the Fondation's exhibit is the original.  A beautiful painting.

Léger, Composition with two parrots, 1935-39.

Perriand, Folding wooden chair, 1941

In France, women were given the right to vote in 1944.  In 1950, Elle magazine proposed a hypothetical government composed entirely of women, revealed via photomontage.  Perriand, "one of the few female architects", was included in the article and named Minister of Reconstruction.

Perriand is the third from the left in the back row #15.

Perriand also took part in the founding of "Formes Utiles" (Useful forms), a movement created by the Union of modern artists, to bring designers and manufactures closed together.  For its first exhibition at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, she invited Léger, Miró, Calder and Le Corbusier to show their work beside wicker baskets, irons, furniture.  All works were selected for their balance between beauty, function, quality, and cost effectiveness.

Jacques Nathan-Garamond (1910-2001) Poster for the UAM exhibition "Useful forms".

Léger, Dancer with horse, 1953. This picture was lent for a show apartment.

Perriand's furniture for the Franco-American memorial hospital in Saint-Lô- she was on the design team as "consulting engineer" for the furnishings

There were a number of rooms with amazing furniture that Perriand designed.  Bookcases, tables, chairs and rugs.

Center of the exhibition "Proposal for a Synthesis of the Arts", Paris 1955.  Le Corbusier, Léger, Perriand.

Perriand, Rectangle dining table with a groove 1954

She returned to Japan between 1953-55 and designed an exhibition on the theme of 'synthesis of the arts".  It opened on April 1, 1955 in the Takashimaya department store in Tokyo.  Tapastries by Le Corbusier and Léger were part of the exhibit.

Perriand at the exhibition

In 1956, Steph Simon, a graduate of the Arts et Métier school, opened a gallery in Saint-Germain des Prés, placing it under the auspices of Perriand and Jean Prouvé.  For around 15 years, the gallery produced their furniture and presented a selection of objects, including Isamu Noguchi's lights.  While not a great economic success, it influenced a generation of architects, designers and clients who embraced its "art of dwelling."

La Galerie Steph Simon vers 1958

Noguchi (1904-1988) Lamps vers 1958

Perriand, Buffet-sideboard vers 1958

Perriand, Wall lamps with adjustable shutters Édition Steph Simon 1962,  Bloc sideboard, Édition Steph Simon, very 1960

The last room included Harmony and Peace- The Tea House at UNESCO, 1993.  Sôri Yanagi, a designer said that "out of all the Westerners who worked in Japan, she was probably the one who had the greatest influence on the world of Japanese design".  Perriand also did the interior architecture and fittings for the Japanese ambassador's residence in Paris in 1956.  

The Tea House was commissioned as part of Japanese cultural festival in Paris in 1993.

Lord Snowdon (1930-2017) Charlotte Perrriand wearing a piece from the Issey Miyake Permanente collection fall winter 1988-89, 1989

Noguchi, Sculpture finding, 1979.  Noguchi succeeded Perrriand as advisor for industrial creation in Japan after the war.  Perriand introduced his lamps to France.

Perriand, Tea House, 1993

At the entrance/exit to the exhibit- one of my favourite photos of Perrriand taken by Jeanneret in 1935 at Val d'Isère

Café at the Museum

View of the outside of the Fondation building

Another angle

Water on stairs at one side of the building

It was an amazing exhibit.  Perriand was so forward thinking and accomplished so much during her 96 years, basically spanning the 20th century.   While Le Corbusier did take more credit then he should have for some of the pieces which she almost completely designed, Perriand was recognised and celebrated in her own right for her incredible contribution to furniture design, architecture and interior design.   Her designs for apartments are so modern that one could move right into them in 2019, although some of her furniture would have to be scaled down for modern condo living!   The integration of the arts and her view that art and architecture should be accessible were also forward looking.  The exhibit, which took up most of the building, was one of my favourites of the trip.  Very inspiring.

We took the Metro back to our 'hood and went for dinner at a local bistro Le petit marché.  The inside was packed, so we ate outside.  There were very good heaters, and it was lovely to eat out in October.  Alain had lamb and I had sea bass.

Le petit marché and the outside seating

Busy inside of restaurant

Lots of pictures inside

It was another especially wonderful day in Paris.