The six years between André Marfaing's installation in Paris and the first exhibition of his work at the Claude Bernard Gallery were decisive for this artist from the Toulouse region. In the immediate post-war period, he met Alfred Manessier, with whom he became very close, and then, the following year, Pierre Soulages, whose aesthetics would remain in close correspondence with his own throughout his life.
André Marfaing (1925-1987)
Juillet 69-19, 1969
Huile sur toile
Signée et datée en bas à droite
Titrée au dos sur le châssis
100 x 81 cm
Result: 39 000 euros
Both from the southwest of France, the two men share a passion for the minimalism of Romanesque art and an irremediable attraction for the expressive power of the colour black. With his works, he sets out with a bang to cast off the moorings that connect him to reality, marking out an itinerary to his mysterious destination. Noticed by the critics at the end of this first exhibition, André Marfaing was invited to take part in the Documenta in Kassel before being invited to participate in the first Paris Biennial at the Museum of Modern Art. The works he presented there won prizes alongside those of Martin Barré, Yves Klein and the American Joan Mitchell.
Contrary to the sculptural dimension of Pierre Soulages' painting, the luminosity of André Marfaing's canvases comes from the meeting of white and black, that is to say - absence of colour and the synthesis of all the chromatic range.
André Marfaing (1925-1987)
Untitled
August 1973
Acrylic on canvas
130 x 97 cm
Signed lower right Dated on the back on the chassis.
Result: 40 300 euros
Thus, "July 69-19" illustrates the use of oil on canvas which characterizes his painting of the 1960s before his switch to acrylic. Marked by the influence of American lyrical abstraction, his painting is more and more gestural as shown in Untitled, an acrylic on canvas made in August 1973. The thickness of the pictorial layer reveals the materialist approach that seduced the painter. Halfway between the architectural structures of a Franz Kline and the energetic aspect of Asian calligraphy, this composition was proposed by the PIASA house during its session of December 3, 2019 orchestrated by the Modern and Contemporary Department.
André Marfaing (1925-1987)
Juillet 72-16, 1972
Acrylique sur toile
Signée en bas à gauche, titrée au dos sur le châssis
92 x 73 cm
Result: 23 400 euros
The emotional charge of a work such as "July 72-16", sold by PIASA on 22 May 2019, places the artist among the leading figures of French abstract painting in the second half of the 20th century. In 2017, his work will be presented at the Musée des beaux-arts de Carcassonne.
In the last years of his life, white increasingly occupies more and more space on the surface of his works. On the occasion of the exhibition devoted to him by the BNF in 2002, the Comité national de la gravure française published its catalogue raisonné.
