Petit Palais presents José María Sert.  

Visited by Henning Høholt and Tomas Bagackas. 

José María Sert: The dining room. Foto Henning Høholt

PARIS: The Petit Palais is presenting a very i nteresting exhibition of the works by José María Sert, a paitner, who liked to call him self a decoration painter, and that can in a way be thrue, but still the painting quality is of such a high quality, that this is art. In the exhibition we enjoy first of all many of his decorations of importent rooms in importent buildings, mansions, churches, interiors, dining rooms of an amazing quality

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Until August 5th. 2012.

The dining room, planed to the German embassy in Madrid showing the Tempest, spring, summer, autumn, winter, which never was delivered and put into the house after the second world war, was bought by the Spanish state some 30 years ago, and is here presented in full sizes, and is an extraordinary visiting card for mr
. Sert and his art. Please enjoy the two photos from that room. A masterpiece.

José María Sert, The Dining room. 2 Foto Henning Høholt

Furthermore the very interesting models of many of his decirations of interiors in buildings, presented, so we can enjoy them close up are very interesting and gives a view in to an importent artists work.

In addition his way of working with motives are presented in details, which is giving inspiration to coming artists, how they can do it. It was not the easiest way Sert was working in, photographing models and groups, then making the same motifs with model figures, again photographing, quadrating the photos, before the real painting work started but, when we see the results, it is beautiful.

“Art has lost the last representative of great painting”, wrote Paul Claudel in Le Figaro on 14 December 1945, on the death of his friend José María Sert. The immensity of his body of work and the strength of his personality made Sert a universally admired artist in his time. The Petit Palais is allowing the public to rediscover him. José María Sert, le Titan à l’œuvre (1874-1945) will open the doors to his workshop to show the strength of his art and the originality of his method.

Sert, a scenic artist, was constantly looking for commissions and worked for personalities from the economic and political world, firstly in Paris and then in Europe and America. This proximity confronted him with the complexities of his era and he made some controversial political choices. He was a “modern Baroque”, full of references to mainstream tradition but declaring the topicality of his art.

The workshop is the main part of this exhibition, which allows visitors to paint a portrait of an artist who is neglected today. This is a novel approach, which aims to make this original and thorough method of creation understandable. A polished, exceptionally well recreated decor stands side by side with approximately 120 works (immense individual panels, sketches, working photographs and designs). Private documents and photographs will allow the visitor to discover the secrets of a workshop. The aim of this ambitious exhibition is to return one of the “Parisian” figures of the century’s international art scene to his rightful place in the history of art.

Commission
Pilar Sáez Lacave, Doctor of Art History
Susana Gállego Cuesta, curator at the Petit Palais.

http://www.petitpalais.paris.fr

Petit Palais
Beaux-Arts Museum of the City of Paris
Avenue Winston Churchill
75008 Paris
Tel.: 01 53 43 40 00
Open every day from 10am to 6pm except Mondays and public holidays.
Thursday evenings until 8pm