A major figure of geometric abstraction, a precursor of minimalist art, but also of interactive art, a champion of numbers and chance, of the curve and the right angle, of order and disorder, of lunatic geometry and random distribution… François Morellet (1926-2016) is a breviary of contemporary art all by himself. Armed with squares, directories, neon lights, and a good dose of humor and fantasy, he has never stopped breaking the neck of the romantic myth of creative subjectivity and taking the painting out of the limits of the, according to him, arbitrary framework imposed by centuries of academicism …
Conceiving the work as a mental and visual space, but also sensual, auditory, olfactory… to “leave the spectator of his apathetic dependence, which makes him accept in a passive way not only what one imposes on him as art, but as a system of life.”1 It does us good… And, presented in the middle of the contemporary works collected by the owners of the Chasse-Spleen Castle, it hits the bull’s eye…
1Groupe de Recherche d’Art Visuel (GRAV) – “Enough mystifications,” Oct 1963
“François Morellet at Chasse-Spleen,” Château and Art Center Chasse-Spleen
32, chemin de la Razé, Moulis-en-Médoc
Until September 30
Stéphanie Dulout