PAINTINGS AND DRAWINGS – JEAN-CHARLES BLAIS
On Friday, November 2, at 6:00 PM, the Pori Art Museum will open an exhibition by French artist Jean-Charles Blais (b. 1956, Nantes), showcasing his latest works from 1987–1990.
Jean-Charles Blais began his artistic career in the late 1970s, creating installations that allowed for the combination of various materials and visual elements. This surprising interplay of materials and innovative applications has carried over into his 1980s paintings. A signature feature of Blais’ work is his use of painting surfaces composed of torn posters or their fragments, which are enlivened by the randomness of their forms and the rawness of their textures.
Blais’ paintings evoke a sense of fragments; they could be parts of large murals. Their world is charged with tension, born from vibrant and dynamic color fields juxtaposed with the presence of an anonymous figure, often sketched in bold, dark strokes. The figures themselves are fragmentary in nature: one might see only a colossal foot or a headless torso. These forms emerge from an intuitive working process, without prior planning or sketches.
Throughout his career, Blais has engaged in a dialogue with numerous traditions of modern art. This engagement is not so much a deliberate act but rather a process of utilizing, adapting, and transforming his cultural heritage to achieve a deeply personal synthesis, creating entirely independent traditions of his own. For instance, in the early 1980s, his starting point was Malevich’s Fauvist-inspired paintings with their massive, clumsy figures that seem to be constructed from conical shapes. Since then, many other masters of modern art have left their imprint on Blais’ paintings through a similar process of recycling, much like the way old posters or any other material finds its way into his works.
Despite the recurring theme of heavy, fragmented figures in his paintings, Blais himself considers each of his works “autonomous and solitary,” unrelated to any series or preconceived theme. Similarly, his drawings in charcoal or pastel, an essential part of his oeuvre, are independent works. They do not form series nor serve as sketches for his paintings. Drawings possess their own unique character, offering a means to tell entirely different stories than painting.
A publication accompanying Jean-Charles Blais’ exhibition has been prepared by Xavier Girard, director of the Musée Matisse in Nice and an art critic. This publication provides context for the exhibition by presenting the artist’s work from his years at the École des Beaux-Arts in Rennes to the present day.
Following its run in Pori, a selection of drawings from the exhibition will be presented at the Estonian State Art Museum in Tallinn in January–February 1991. From March to May, the exhibition will be on display at the Nordjyllands Kunstmuseum in Aalborg, Denmark.
The exhibition has been supported by the Association Française d’Action Artistique and the Sampo Group.
Publication:
ISBN 951-9355-29-4 Jean-Charles Blais
Published by: Atelier d’Éditions “Deux Trois Façons”
Graphic design and production: Grégoire Gardette and Xavier Girard
Images featured in the text: André Morin, François Fernandez, Jacques Hoepffner, Konstantinos Ignatiadis
Cover: Xavier Girard
Pori Art Museum Publications 12
Translated with ChatGPT