Gaston Chaissac

Gaston Chaissac , born the August 13rd 1910 with Avallon, deceased the November 7th 1964 with the Roche-sur-Yon was a painter French.

He is also known for his many correspondences, but also texts and poems published inter alia with the '' N.R.F. '' and the Pleiad

Biography

Childhood

Gaston Chaissac is born on August 13rd 1910 with Avallon (Yonne) parents corréziens. His/her father is shoe-maker. After the war and the separation of his parents, the Chaissac young person remains with his mother. Its schooling is, as he will say it itself, “short and weak”. The school is appropriate to him hardly. Its health appears fragile. Often sick, it develops little by little a sensitive to the cold and ascetic lifestyle. It is observed besides that the characters of its tables - and even of its “totems” - have a frequently atrophied body, and that their face expresses sometimes a feeling of suffering.

At the thirteen years age, Chaissac leaves the school to enter in training. It touches with various trades without deciding to embrace some no in particular.

In 1931, it is tested hard by the death of his/her mother. The marriage of his/her sister, who leaves the family unit consequently, also constitutes a shock for him. It will take a long time to overcome this double traumatism.

Paris and tuberculosis

In 1934, it tries to be established in Paris. It opens a graver of shoe-maker street Mouffetard. , With animation grouillante of its streets, it likes the big city, but not succeeding in earning its living, it leaves first once the capital to return there in 1937. It settles then in his brother, street Henri Barbusse. In the same building the abstract painter Otto Freundlich lives. This last and his wife, who is also painter, encourage Chaissac to draw. The first results of this activity appear full to them with future. “A Master was born to us” would then have said Freundlich. At all events, this last will not cease any more, until its death in deportation (1943), to help and advise Chaissac.

To the autumn 1937, Chaissac falls seriously sick. A tuberculosis is diagnosed. It is sent to the sanatorium of Arnière, in the the Eure. The treatment does not prevent it from continuing to paint: in December 1938 takes place its first exposure personal to Paris. Albert Gleizes and Robert Delaunay is interested highly in work that it presents to it.

Of 1939 with 1942, Chaissac completes to cure in a house in the Dordogne. It is there that, in Christmas 1940, it meets his future wife.

In 1942, to the invitation of Gleizes, it leaves for Saint-Rémy-of-Provence. While working in a harness-maker, it paints in the workshop of Gleizes thanks to which it becomes acquainted with André Lhote. It Marie with the end of the year and, in 1943, presents its second exposure to Paris, at the House of the Intellectuals. Raymond Queneau, brought by Jeanne Kosnick-Kloss (widowed of Freundlich), sees it and appreciates it. The same exposure is announced - with enthusiasm to Jean Paulhan.

The Vendée

In 1943 the woman of Chaissac, which is teacher, is named with Boulogne in the Vendée. The couple settles there for five years. Chaissac, from now on débarassé of the preoccupation with a its survival, can be finally devoted entirely to its artistic activities. In 1944, it takes part in the Salon of Independent the. In June 1945 begins a correspondence with Paulhan which allures Dubuffet ; this last writes to him then in its turn and becomes purchaser of some of these works.

In 1947, new personal exposure to Paris, the Gallery Rainbow. The foreword is signed Dubuffet, where this last compares the art of Chaissac with that of the Bedouins who, in the Sahara, play of the flute while making fun of “” civilization.

In 1948, his wife is named in another Vendean commune, Holy-Florence-with-L' Goose. The couple will remain thirteen years there. Difficult years for the painter who, refusing to play the game of the parisianism while at the same time it aspires to being recognized by his pars, rejected by the majority of the inhabitants of his commune who take it for a wizard or insane, is in prey with a terrible loneliness. Its creativity feels some and in the years 1956 - 1958, it almost does not paint.

This loneliness is however broken by far in far: visit Anatole Jakovsky in 1948 (which will publish a book on Chaissac shortly after) and of Dubuffet, which invites the painter to take part in the exposure of rough art of the Gallery Rene Drouin; visit of the photographer Gilles Erhmann in 1955 which, entousiasmé, returns in company of the surrealist poet Benjamin Péret. In 1956, Chaissac accomplishes a short stay in the house of Dubuffet to Vence. After this date, their reports/ratios are being spaced. The last letter of Dubuffet in Chaissac quoted in Leaflets and all written following, date of 1961.

After the sending of a text of Chaissac to the '' N.R.F. '' in 1954, this one will publish 1957 regularly with 1960 its “Chronicles of Goose”, humorous articles intersected with poetic reflections.

It is only in 1961, with the installation of the couple with Vix (the Vendée), that Chaissac starts to leave its insulation. This same year it receives the visit of Iris Clert which organizes to him a personal exposure in its gallery, that one even of Yves Klein and new “realistic”…

In 1962 leaves the book Gilles Erhmann, Inspired and their residences , in which Chaissac is in company of other autodidacts. It occupies however a dominating place in the book thanks to the texts of André Breton and Benjamin Péret. In the months which follow, Germany, Italy, the United States is interested suddenly in him… But alas, it is too late. Mined by the anxiety, the difficulties material, the troubles of health, Chaissac of a pulmonary embolism at the hospital of the Roche-sur-Yon dies on November 7th 1964.

Chaissac and the rough Art

The relations between Gaston Chaissac and Jean Dubuffet were at the very least tumultuous, but highly symptomatic of the history and the evolution of the rough Art…

Chaissac is very early integrated into the collection of Dubuffet, and is exposed as of 1948 with the other creators of the Hearth of the rough Art (which will become the Company of rough Art, then the Collection of rough art). But in 1963 is created the second Company of rough Art, at the time of the return of the collection of America. Dubuffet must then re-examine the ideological bases which define the rough Art, which leads to the creation of a “additional Collection” (which will take the final name of “Neuve Invention” in 1982) in which it places Chaissac:

“Silence and the secrecy remain for Dubuffet the bases inherent in the true artistic production; the self-educated creator works for his own use, without aspiring to the communication nor with the diffusion of his work. Dubuffet pushes then its theory socio-esthetics with its limits and denounces contradiction existing between the production of art and the social recognition. “You cannot be a creator and be greeted by the public of this title. (…) It is necessary to choose between making art and being held for an artist. One excludes the other. (letter with Pierre Carbonel) ”. He then withdraws some creators of the group of rough Art and transfers their productions in the additional collections - such is the case for Gaston Chaissac, Philippe Dereux and Ignacio Carles-Tolra. More than very other, the transfer of Chaissac was and remains a subject of polemic. Many are those which showed Dubuffet to have enlisted it in the rough Art, to have plundered it and have plagiarized for finally disavowing it by relegating it in the additional collections. Initially, Dubuffet saw in Chaissac the man of the common creator, this essential figure of its philosophical and artistic design. Then it revised its judgment, holding account not only cultural luggage of Chaissac but also of its knowledge and its bonds increasingly more important with Parisian life. Chaissac is " too much informed of what the artists professionnels" do;.”

Dedication

After its death, Chaissac will be finally integrated in the History of the Modern art.

Institutions muséales granted retrospectives to him:

Very many articles were devoted to him, in the reviews Arts, the Eye, Art schools, Connaissance of Arts, Le Monde, Télérama, the Express train, Libération, etc

Artists recognized like Georg Baselitz or Robert Combas assert his influence direct.

In permance : One can see a significant whole of paintings of Gaston Chaissac to the Musée of the Abbey Holy-Cross of Sands of Olonne, which has one of the most important funds of the painter (entirely restored in 2004), following a donation of his widow.

Quotations

“It was a time when, finding that I had too much painted catches, I transformed them into abstracted painting, but here are which I would have tendency to make of my not-figurative catches” letter with Jean Dubuffet, 1957

“My painting will undoubtedly be sold better after my death” letter with Iris Clert, 1961

“That thought are of my work and their author? Admittedly, by seeing some of my paintings full with freshness, which would suspect that it is disillusioned which did them? I will undoubtedly remain for much a enigma” letter with Otto Freundlich, 1940

“My preferences go from the start to modern rustic painting. Painter of village, I remain to him faithful, too sure to make false route if I sought to paint the made-to-order of the painters of the capitals and sub-prefectures. In our deserted campaigns, nothing stops the meditation necessary before any artistic creation. Not having no need for the drawing and the pallet of the others, forgetting the universe and working without another concern to progress in a continuous way until our death, of the innovations belong to us, it has there to only collect” appeared in Centres, 1946

Sources

See too

Monographs

  • Dominique Allan-Michaud, Gaston Chaissac, puzzle for a man alone , Gallimard, Paris, 1974 (republication in 1992)
  • Henri-Claude Cousseau, Gaston Chaissac " shoe-maker in partibus" ; Work graphic , Jacques Damase, Paris, 1981
  • Barbara Nathan-Neher, Chaissac , Thames and Hudson, London, 1987
  • Johannes Gachnang and Francoise Brütsch, Gaston Chaissac , Ides and Calendes, Neuchâtel, 1988
  • Anatole Jakovsky, Gaston Chaissac, the one-man band , the Literary Presses of France, Paris, 1952 (republication with the Graver, Caen, 1992)
  • Collectif, Gaston Chaissac , Musée of the Holy-Cross Abbey, Sands of Olonne, 1993
  • Collectif, Gaston Chaissac , Réunion of the National museums, 1998
  • Serge Fauchereau, Gaston Chaissac: surroundings and asides , Somogy, Editions of Art, Paris, 1998
  • Thomas Guillou, Gaston Chaissac , Ides and Calendes, Neuchâtel, 2000 Collective
  • , Chaissac , National Gallery of Jeu de Paume, Meeting of the National museums, 2000 Collective
  • , Gaston Chaissac, man of letters , 3Ecole Nationale Sup3erieure of the Art schools & Museum of the Post office, 2006

Writings of Chaissac

  • Hippobosque with the Scrap-metal , Gallimard, 1951 (republication in 1995)
  • Very In a friendly way Yours , Louvière, Belgium, 1965 (republication in 1996)
  • the Carelessness of Eliminated - Letters to the abbot Costing , Full-Song, Bassac, 1979
  • Thirty and one Letters with Pierre Boujut , Full Song, Bassac, 1979
  • I seek my editor, letters, tales, documents , Mortemart, Rougerie, 1998
  • Correspondances , Musée of the Abbey Holy-Cross, 2004

Notable articles, Chapters of books

  • Dominique Allan Michaud, in the Wild Egg N°7, Full Margin, 1993
  • Jean-Louis Ferrier, “the painter of the precarious life”, p 44-53, in the Primitive ones of the 20th century , Terrail, 1997
  • Christian Delacampagne, “Chaissac: a scientist in shoes”, chapitre7, pp106-119, in Outsiders, insane, naive and indicators in modern painting (1889-1960) , Mengès Editions, Paris, 1989
  • David Maclaglan, “Gaston Chaissac - Raw Classics”, in Raw Vision N°32, 2000

External bonds

  • Page of Arte on Chaissac
  • With the Museum of the Abbey Holy-Cross
  • With the Collection of Rough Art
  • the file of the World of Arts

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