For the exhibition at the Château de Sannes, Thierry Lefort embarks us in the light of Cézanne but under the sun of California where the shadows, the palm trees and the electric posts give rhythm to the space. Two techniques complement each other, oil painting on canvas and ink on paper. At the limit between figuration and abstraction, Thierry Lefort likes to assemble elements to lead to a composition. For the Château de Sannes, and as a wink to the vine, he realized big inks by assembling three sheets of a size called grape. All the works presented here are exhibited for the first time.
Thierry Lefort is a French artist who lives and works between Paris and Los Angeles. Since his youth, painting has been his means of expression to apprehend the world, its light, its colors and its beauty. An admirer of Cézanne, he applies his credo that "painting from nature is not slavishly copying, it is realizing one's sensations".
Thierry Lefort's painting is not devoid of a spirituality met sometimes near other cultures. From 1997 to 2000, he travels through the province of Henan in China, cradle of the Chinese civilization and kungfu. Then, it is by calligraphy and inspired by China and Japan, that he develops his pictorial art further by seeking to paint in an effective, powerful and purified way. From then on, Thierry Lefort directs himself towards a painting that some will qualify as Renaissance of the Figuration, with all that it comprises of simplicity, elegance and purity.
The force and the characteristic of Thierry Lefort reside not only in his technique but also in his re-reading of the world which surrounds him, in particular the industrial and urban world. He paints his pictures sometimes in situ, in the street, carrying an enthusiastic glance on places as diverse and anodyne as stations, factories, bridges, parking lots. The human being seems to be absent, yet we suspect it.
It is not necessary to be mistaken there, Thierry Lefort does not seek to deliver a faithful image of the decoration, the landscapes or the cities which he paints, with him it is not the Painting which serves the landscape, but well the landscape which serves the Painting, to reach the perfect balance of the composition.
Among the notable places which presented the works of Thierry Lefort, let us note the Constantine Palace of Saint-Petersburg, in Russia and, twice, the Museum of modern art of Tokyo, in Japan.
In 2021, Yoyo Maeght dedicates to him, in Paris, an important exhibition that will be followed in the fall of 2022 by a new exhibition of large size paintings.
Yoyo Maeght conceives and organizes exhibitions internationally, notably for the Maeght Foundation, created by her grandfather Aimé Maeght in Saint-Paul-de-Vence, but also for the Centre Pompidou, the Yokohama Museum in Japan, the Beijing Imperial Museum in China, the Pera Museum in Istanbul, Turkey, and the Pinacoteca de San Paolo in Brazil. She is also a publisher of limited edition prints. She is the author of the best-selling book La Saga Maeght. Works on display
Click on the images to zoom in.
Los Angeles river, 65 x 80,5 cm, Oil on canvas
La Vallée des stars II, 65 x 46 cm, Oil on canvas
Le Sourire de John Wayne, 195 x 97 cm, Oil on canvas
The blue curtain 2020 46 x 38 cm, Oil on canvas
Hollywood now 14, 15 et 16 - each 150 x 65 cm
Hollywood now 08 - 65 x 50 cm
Hollywood now 09 - 65 x 50 cm
Hollywood now 10 - 65 x 50 cm
Hollywood now 11 - 65 x 50 cm
Hollywood now 12 - 65 x 50 cm
Hollywood now 13 - 65 x 50 cm
Hollywood now 17 - 65 x 50 cm
Hollywood now 14 - 150 x 65 cm
Hollywood now 15 - 150 x 65 cm
Hollywood now 17 - 150 x 65 cm
Exhibition at the Château de Sannes, summer 2022
