Geneviève CLAISSE

Geneviève CLAISSE (1937 - 2018)

A relative of Auguste Herbin, originally from the same place, her pictorial vocation was born from reading the magazine Art of today, a platform for geometric abstraction.

In 1961, Geneviève Claisse exhibited constructed works. She will be permanently represented from one exhibition to another: Paris, Copenhagen, Leverkusen, Lausanne, London. It is in 1964 that appears under the title Earth-century the theme of the circles, of which it will develop the innumerable potentialities without modifying the graphics. Based on research on this theme, the Cercles screenprint album, published in 1967, illustrates this period2.

Shortly before the Circles theme, other simple, autonomous forms like him of traditional composition and combinatorial processes appeared: Triangles. In 1964, Geneviève Claisse was able to give her circles and triangles the architectural dimensions that suited them: it was the wall unit of the hall of the company SCAC whose modern building overlooks the banks of the Seine at Puteaux .

In 1965, the Biennale de Paris distinguished its participation in red in white Alpha-Ville and in black and white Situations. The new dimensions, the permutation are not at the expense of the form which retains all its meaning, nor of the composition. The construction remains synthetic, clearly and generally dominated by the author, for whom the technique is at the service of creation and not vice versa3.

In January 1967 the Museum of Fine Arts of La Chaux-de-Fonds exhibits works from the past ten years. At the Universal Exhibition in Montreal, she decorated the basin of the French pavilion4.

In 2015, the Matisse Museum in Cateau-Cambrésis presents a retrospective of the works of Geneviève Claisse. She realizes a work in situ for the exhibition.

In 2018, she was preparing an exhibition in London