Gérard Fromanger
Encyclopedia
Gérard Fromanger is a French
artist
born on 6 September 1939 in Jouars-Pontchartrain, Yvelines
. A painter who has also used collage
, sculpture, photography, cinema and lithography, he is associated with the French artistic movement of the 1960s and 1970s called Figuration Narrative (new figurative representation), somewhat like pop art
.
Fromanger studied at the École des Beaux-Arts
in Paris
, where his first solo exhibition was held in 1966. Souffles, his large translucent "half-balloon" street sculptures, attracted attention in 1968.He also collaborated with jean-luc godard to make the short "Film-tract 1968". Urban life and the consumer society are themes well-represented in his work.
The Nouvelle Figuration movement (sometimes called figuration narrative or représentation narrative) is considered to have been a reaction against abstract art
, with a more political slant than American pop art. Fromanger has been described as a social critic who takes a political position without neglecting the poetic dimension.
Michel Foucault
, a friend of Fromanger's, wrote about his work in Photogenic Painting.
In 2005 a retrospective exhibition, Gérard Fromanger: rétrospective 1962-2005, was shown at various galleries in France, Belgium, Luxembourg and Switzerland. Fromanger now lives and works in both Siena
and Paris.
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
artist
Artist
An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...
born on 6 September 1939 in Jouars-Pontchartrain, Yvelines
Yvelines
Yvelines is a French department in the region of Île-de-France.-History:Yvelines was created from the western part of the defunct department of Seine-et-Oise on 1 January 1968 in accordance with a law passed on 10 January 1964 and a décret d'application from 26 February 1965.It gained the...
. A painter who has also used collage
Collage
A collage is a work of formal art, primarily in the visual arts, made from an assemblage of different forms, thus creating a new whole....
, sculpture, photography, cinema and lithography, he is associated with the French artistic movement of the 1960s and 1970s called Figuration Narrative (new figurative representation), somewhat like pop art
Pop art
Pop art is an art movement that emerged in the mid 1950s in Britain and in the late 1950s in the United States. Pop art challenged tradition by asserting that an artist's use of the mass-produced visual commodities of popular culture is contiguous with the perspective of fine art...
.
Fromanger studied at the École des Beaux-Arts
École des Beaux-Arts
École des Beaux-Arts refers to a number of influential art schools in France. The most famous is the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts, now located on the left bank in Paris, across the Seine from the Louvre, in the 6th arrondissement. The school has a history spanning more than 350 years,...
in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, where his first solo exhibition was held in 1966. Souffles, his large translucent "half-balloon" street sculptures, attracted attention in 1968.He also collaborated with jean-luc godard to make the short "Film-tract 1968". Urban life and the consumer society are themes well-represented in his work.
The Nouvelle Figuration movement (sometimes called figuration narrative or représentation narrative) is considered to have been a reaction against abstract art
Abstract art
Abstract art uses a visual language of form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. Western art had been, from the Renaissance up to the middle of the 19th century, underpinned by the logic of perspective and an...
, with a more political slant than American pop art. Fromanger has been described as a social critic who takes a political position without neglecting the poetic dimension.
Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault , born Paul-Michel Foucault , was a French philosopher, social theorist and historian of ideas...
, a friend of Fromanger's, wrote about his work in Photogenic Painting.
In 2005 a retrospective exhibition, Gérard Fromanger: rétrospective 1962-2005, was shown at various galleries in France, Belgium, Luxembourg and Switzerland. Fromanger now lives and works in both Siena
Siena
Siena is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena.The historic centre of Siena has been declared by UNESCO a World Heritage Site. It is one of the nation's most visited tourist attractions, with over 163,000 international arrivals in 2008...
and Paris.
Books
- Bernard Ceysson Gérard Fromanger (Catalogue for retrospective exhibition 2005)
- Gilles Deleuze and Michel Foucault Photogenic Painting (2000)
- Alain Jouffroy Gérard Fromanger (1973)
- Serge July Fromanger (2000)