Laure Albin Guillot (1879–1962), The Question of ... · Laure Albin Guillot (1879–1962), The Question of Classicism Exhibition from 5 June to 1 September 2013 Press pack

Laure Albin Guillot (1879–1962), The Question of ClassicismExhibition from 5 June to 1 September 2013

Press pack

2/13Laure Albin Guillot Press pack

Laure Albin Guillot (1879–1962),The Question of ClassicismFrom 5 June to 1 September 2013

Contents

Presentation of the Exhibition 3-5

Laure Albin Guillot’s Biography 6 Beyond the Exhibition 7

Events Programs 2013 8-9

Press Images 10-11

The Musée de l’Elysée 12

Practical Information 13

Press ConferenceTuesday 4 June 2013 at 2pm

OpeningWednesday 5 June 2013 at 6pm

Press ContactJulie Maillard+41 ( 0 ) 21 316 99 [email protected]

Cover: Jean Cocteau, 1939, Private collection, Paris © Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-ViolletAbove: Lucienne Boyer, ca 1935, Collections Roger-Viollet / Parisienne de Photographie © Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

The exhibition Laure Albin Guillot, The Question of Classicism is organized jointly by the Jeu de Paume, Paris, and the Musée de l’Elysée in collaboration with the Parisienne de Photographie


Laure Albin Guillot (Paris, 1879–1962), a “resounding name that should become famous”, one could read just after World War II. Indeed, the French photographic scene in the middle of the century was particularly marked by the signature and aura of this artist, who during her lifetime was certainly the most exhibited and recognised, not only for her talent and virtuosity but also for her professional engagement.

The exhibition presented at the Musée de l’Elysée in collaboration with the Jeu de Paume gathers a significant collection of 200 origi-nal prints and books by Laure Albin Guillot, as well as magazines and documents of the period from public and private collections. A large number of the original prints and documents on show come from the collections of the Agence Roger-Viollet, in collab-oration with Parisienne de Photographie, which acquired Laure Albin Guillot’s studio stock in 1964. Made up of 52’000 negatives and 20’000 prints, this source has made it possible to question the oeuvre and the place that the photographer really occupies in history. The photographer’s work could appear as a counter-current to the French artistic scene of the 1920s to 40s, whose modernity and avant-garde production attract our attention and appeal to cur-rent tastes. It is however this photography, incarnating classicism and a certain “French style” that was widely celebrated at the time.

If Laure Albin Guillot’s photography was undeniably in vogue between the wars, her personality remains an enigma. Paradoxically, very little research has been carried out into the work and career of this artist. Her first works were seen in the salons and publications of the early 1920s, but it was essentially during the 1930s and 40s that Laure Albin Guillot, artist, professional and institutional figure, dominated the photographic arena. As an independent photographer, she practised several genres, including portraiture, the nude, landscape, still life and, to a lesser degree, documentary photography. Technically unrivalled, she raised the practice to a certain elitism. A photographer of her epoch, she used the new means of distribution of the image to provide illustrations and advertising images for the press and publishing industry.She was notably one of the first in France to consider the deco-rative use of photography through her formal research into the infinitely tiny. With photomicrography, which she renamed “micro-graphie”, Laure Albin Guillot offfered new creative perspectives in the combination of art and science. Finally, as member of the Société des artistes décorateurs, the Société française de photo-graphie, director of photographic archives for the Direction générale des Beaux-Arts (forerunner of the Ministry of Culture) and director of the project for the Cinémathèque nationale, president of the Union féminine des carrières libérales, she emerges as one of the most active personalities and most aware of the photographic and cultural stakes of the period.

Advertisement for the vaccine-cream Salantale, ca 1942, Bibliothèque nationale de FranceNude study, ca 1940, Collections Roger-Viollet /Parisienne de Photographie © Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

Exhibition curators• Delphine DesveauxDirector of the Roger-Viollet collections at the Parisienne de Photographie• Michaël Houlette Curator and exhibition coordinator, Jeu de Paume

Exhibition coordinator in Lausanne• Daniel GirardinChief Curator, Musée de l’Elysée


Organised in four parts, the exhibition explores the various aspects of Laure Albin Guillot’s work.

PortraitsLaure Albin Guillot began her career in the early 1920s with portraits and fashion photography. Already, her trademark was elegance, her method was quite systematic and she used various artifices: pared-back decor, close-ups, limited depth of field, simple lighting. The sought-after effect of interiority and intimacy was accentuated by inspired poses that translate the sitter’s character as is done by painters. She accepted being compared to the pictorialists. At the start she was quite close to them in her form and technique, following an aesthetic whose expression was facilitated by her use of lenses that blur (Opale and Eïdoscope). Her sessions were short (never more than twenty minutes), the lamps were positioned to sup-plement each other and not a detail was left in the shadow thanks to a weaker lighting facing the first; while claiming not to go beyond a certain naturalism, she improved the natural: contours are softened, the diffused light is flattering.In the exercise of the nude, the photographer privileged the mas-tery of form over inspiration, she sought a poetic purity, a dema-terialisation of the body through the power of the spirit; her nudes are constructed by light, they tend towards the ideal. In complete contrast to the importance of character in the portrait, its reduction to a visual form makes the model into a collection of lines, the face is pushed into the corners, almost rubbed out. Laure Albin Guillot did not practise a fragmented language, she proposed fluid forms that appear simple but in reality are highly worked. The reference to statuary is assumed and provides a wide variety of uses for the photographs, each containing several.

A Decorative ArtAfter 1918, Paris rediscovered its artistic vocation and the “French style” triumphed at the 1925 Exposition internationale des arts indus-triels et modernes. Alongside the artists and craftsmen, Laure Albin Guillot exhibited an exceptional series of portraits of decorators. She herself made some kakemonos starting from stylised photographs and, inspired by Japanisation, she had some of her photographs inserted into lacquered wood as screens or fire guards.In 1931, her book Micrographie décorative won her instant interna-tional recognition; the work is a visual curiosity, playing on the ambi-guity between the origins of the photographic subject and the nature of the reproduced image. The twenty plates of diatoms, minerals and plants taken through a microcope are as much aesthetic proposi-tions as the magisterial culmination of a reflection shared with her late husband, himself a collector of microscopic preparations. This much publicised publication triggered a series of glowing articles that enthused on the fusion between science and art. The micro-graphs were declined in wallpaper, silks, bindings and assorted objects. In the debate between partisans and detractors of photogra-phy as art, she provided her answer: according to her, photography is a decorative art. Micrographie décorative was to be published with a preface by Paul Léon, Director of Fine Art, in homage to Albin Guillot, deceased in 1929.

Hubert de Givenchy, 1948, Collections Roger-Viollet / Parisienne de Photographie © Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-ViolletMicrography, Hippuric Acid, ca 1931, Collection Société française de photographie © Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet


Advertising PhotographyIn 1933, Laure Albin Guillot published Photographie publicitaire (Advertising Photography). This book is one of the rare theoretical works written by a French photographer between the wars. At the time she was known for her portraits, her decorative proposals, her fashion photographs and advertising images. But she was also an institutional figure, director of both the photographic archives of the Beaux-Arts (the future Ministry of Culture) and the Cinémathèque nationale.Laure Albin Guillot was fully aware of the media and commercial stakes developing around the cinema, radio and the illustrated press. Based on her own experience, she tried with this book to define the role that photography could play in the world of advertising that was taking shape. From the end of the 1920s, she carried out a large number of adver-tising illustrations. She thus elaborated a repertory of simple, effec-tive and easily understandable visual diagrams. A large proportion of her work concerned luxury products such as fine watchmaking, jewellery or fashion. But she also carried out numerous advertise-ments for the cosmetic and pharmaceutical industries, the newest and most dynamic industrial sectors of the time.

Books and Bibliophile EditionsLaure Albin Guillot’s work was published extensively. The photogra-pher did not work only for the press but also for book publishers, whether it was a matter of portraits of writers for the frontispiece of novels or photographs used here and there in collective works. Between 1934 and 1951, she illustrated no less than eleven books of varying type and subject: novel, school textbook, guide to the Musée du Louvre, prayer book, etc.In parallel, in collaboration with Paul Valéry, Henry de Montherlant, Marcelle Maurette and Maurice Garçon, she made sumptuous “artist’s books” combining literature and photography. It was with a real strategy of promoting her work that the photographer undertook these works, which were mostly sold by subscription. Their fabrica-tion, luxury and rarity made them true collectors’ pieces at a time when a photography market did not exist (“I made photography an accepted part of bibliophilia,” she would write at the end of her life). Exhibitions and artist’s books were intimately linked in her method: their publication was heralded by the presentation at a salon or a gal-lery of sets of prestigious proofs (the large majority pigmented proofsfrom Ateliers Fresson). Thus, the large-format prints exhibited in this section showing roads or landscapes were probably destinated to appear in albums finally not published.

Advertisement study, undated, Collection Musée Nicéphore Niépce, Ville de Chalon-sur-SaôneLes tierces alternées, illustration for les Préludes de Claude Debussy, 1948, Musée français de la photographie / Conseil général de l’Essonne, Benoît Chain © Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet


Selfportrait, ca 1935, Collection Musée Nicéphore Niépce, Ville de Chalon-sur-Saône© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

Laure Albin Guillot’s Biography (1879-1962)

1879 Birth of Laure Meifredy on 14 February in Paris. She studies at the Lycée Molière, rue du Ranelagh, in the 16th arrondissement of Paris, and lives in the district all her life. Pianist, she would later say that she was destined for a career as concert performer.

1897 Marries Albin Guillot, medical student, organist and composer, who would exercise several professions: expert for the Paris hospitals, resercher and industrialist.

1922 “Madame Albin Guillot” publishes her first fashion photographs in Vogue. Opens a portrait studio in her home at 88 rue du Ranelagh.

1924 Publishes in Les Modes, L’Officiel de la couture et de la mode de Paris and Lectures pour tous. Takes part in the Salon des artistes décorateurs and the Salon international de photographie organised by the Société française de photographie (SFP). Exhibits in these two Salons every year until the beginning of the 1950s.

1925 Becomes member of the Société française de photographie. Exhibits at the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes. In the future, “Laure Albin Guillot” is her artistic name. It is the start of her celebrity.

1928 The Salon de l’Escalier, first independent photography salon in Paris, gathers works by Atget, D’Ora, Kertész, Krull, Man Ray, Albin Guillot, Paul Nadar and Outerbridge.

1929 Death of Albin Guillot. Moves to 43 boulevard de Beauséjour, has a studio constructed by Mallet-Stevens. Receives and photographs personalities of art, music and literature, such as Paul Valéry, Colette, Anna de Noailles, Jean Cocteau.

1930 During the 1930s makes several voyages to North Africa, Spain, Italy, Sweden, Norway and the United States. Her photography output is widely reproduced in the press and is the subject of several books. She participates in numerous solo and group shows in salons and galleries in Paris and abroad. 1931 President of the Union féminine des carrières libérales et commerciales (Female Union of Independent and Business Careers). Publishes Micrographie décorative, luxurious work reproducing micrographs of microscopic preparations considered as decorative possibilities. This series had been initiated with her husband, himself a collector of such preparations.

1932 Is appointed head of the photographic archive of the Beaux-Arts administration (future Ministry of Culture).

1933 Becomes director of the Cinémathèque nationale and conceives a vast project for a museum reuniting the “mechanical arts”: cinema, photography and records. The museum never sees the light of day.

1936 Illustrates Narcisse by Paul Valéry. The work is the first in a series of sumptuous artist’s books combining photography and literature.

1937 Member of the installation committee for photography and cinema at the Exposition internationale des arts et techniques. She will later be responsible for the general report for the same exhibition. Coorganises and participates in the exhibition Les femmes artistes d’Europe (Women Artists from Europe) at the Jeu de Paume.

1939 Takes views concerning the protection of Paris monuments and the evacuation of the collections of the Musée du Louvre.

1940 Leaves the direction of the photographic archives. Publishes several artist’s books during the Occupation: La Cantate du Narcisse by Paul Valéry (1941), Petits Métiers de Paris (1942), Arbres with Paul Valéry (1943), Ciels with Marcelle Maurette (1944).

1942 Alongside Robert Doisneau and numerous other photographers, illustrates Nouveaux destins de l’intelligence française, a work intended to promote the intellectual elite favoured by the Vichy regime. Carries out a lot of commercial work during the Occupation, in particular for fashion.

1945-56 Laure Albin Guillot continues to carry out a large number of portraits in her studio on the boulevard de Beauséjour. She publishes her last works: Splendeur de Paris with Maurice Garçon (1945), La Déesse Cypris by Henry de Montherlant (1946) and Illustrations pour les Préludes de Claude Debussy (1948).

1956 Ends her career and retires to the Maison nationale des artistes in Nogent-sur-Marne.

1962 Dies in Paris on 22 February.


Beyond the Exhibition

Catalogue Bilingual French-English Foreword from Marta Gili, texts from Delphine Desveaux, Michaël Houlette, Catherine Gonnard and Patrick-Gilles Persin192 pages, 19,5 x 24 cmCopublished by Editions de La Martinière and the Jeu de Paume, in collaboration with the Musée de l’ElyséePrice at the museum: 45 CHF

Cultural ProgramThe exhibition aims to introduce the work of Laure Albin Guillot to a large public.Among the activities organised for the exhibition:

Guided ToursSunday 9 June at 4 pmSunday 30 June at 4 pmSunday 28 July at 4 pmSunday 25 August at 4 pm

Workshops for Children“Jeux d’image – A playful introduction to the image in photography” for children aged 6 to 12.From Tuesday 9 to Thursday 11 July 2013, 2-7pmThe workshop takes place during three days.Fee: CHF 10.-Only upon registration at: [email protected]

The brochure Visite Découverte offers playful activities that permit children to discover the exhibition by following Eli, the curious little squirrel who loves photography.

Louis Jouvet, ca 1925, Collections Roger-Viollet / Parisienne de Photographie © Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-ViolletMicrography, ca 1929, Private collection, Paris © Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet


Events Program 2013

Travelling ExhibitionsThis summer, the Musée de l’Elysée is showing its exhibitions in France, Switzerland and United States. Initiated last November in the Paris Photo Salon, the Becher’s exhibition continues its tour in the Rencontres d’Arles. As part of ICRC’s 150 years celebration, the Musée de l’Elysée is in partnership with Présence Suisse to show an important exhibition from the Jean Mohr’s collection in the United Nations Office at Geneva. It is the first stage of a world tour. In the same time, on the other side of the Atlantic, the exhibition reGeneration 2 continues its American tour with a stage in Winston-Salem.

The Nuit des imagesThe Nuit des images gains momentum with two events Thursday 27 and Friday 28 June! A new way to celebrate the world of images from every angle! An original program around photography, video and cinema presented on screens set up in the Elysée gardens. Thursday 27 June, starting at 9pm, Rodolphe Burger and Pierre Alferi present an original show conceived from music creations and video excerpts edited by Alferi.Friday 28 June, the Nuit des images starts at 6pm. The public is once again invited to pick its favorites out of some thirty productions to be featured, and to celebrate René Burri’s birthday, journey through Andres Serrano’s Cuba, be charmed by the presence of Anouk Aimée, or enter into the magical and zany forest of Augustin Rebetez. And again, On Print book fair, playful photographic activities for children, a crazy scenography by Francis Traunig, and cartes blanches — given to ECAL, Ringier Archival Fund, gallery TH13 / Fondation d’entreprise Hermès (Bern) and Vevey Photography School —, and four concerts programmed by the Bourg.

With the support of:

Bernd & Hilla Becher – Imprimés 1964-2013Ecole nationale supérieure de la photographie, ArlesFrom 1 July to 15 September 2013

Avec les victimes de guerre. Photographies de Jean MohrOffice des Nations Unies, Palais des Nations, GenèveFrom 20 June to 30 August

reGeneration2 – Tomorrow’s Photo-graphers TodaySoutheastern Center for Contempo-rary Art, Winston-Salem, USAFrom 20 June to 15 September 2013

Jean Mohr, Greek Refugee Camp, Cyprus, 1976 © Jean Mohr, Musée de l’ElyséeEarly evening, Nuit des images 2012 © Reto Duriet

ab Main sponsor


Events Program 2013

ELSE #5 is out The fifth issue of the ELSE magazine comes out in June, at thetime of the summer exhibitions at the Museum, the Nuit des images, and the Rencontres d’Arles. Breaking away from the cult of beautiful images, from a history of photography modelled on the history of fine arts, and from a history of masterpieces, ELSE is a magazine focused on obsessions, and poor, distorted, diverted, appropriated, and re-appropriated images… From comparisons to confrontations, from the historical to the contemporary, from the vernacular to the artistic, ELSE embraces all, mixes everything, and makes a game of classifying images into categories. A plat-form, network, and meeting-point for subversive opinions, ELSE invites an ever-growing circle of those who share its preference for difference. Why ELSE? Because ELySéE. ELSE is edited by the Musée de l’Elysée and presents itself as Switzerland’s photography magazine. Published twice a year, in June and November, ELSE is available in all good bookshops or by subscription.www.elsemag.ch

Exhibitions from 20 September 2013 to 5 January 2014Sebastiao Salgado: GenesisGenesis is a photographic journey into the planet undertaken bySalgado between 2004-2011 to rediscover the mountains, the deserts and the oceans, animals and people that have so far escaped the imprint of modern society. The land and life of a still pristine planet. Yet, Genesis is also a project that speaks urgently to our own age. By portraying the breathtaking beauty of a “lost” world that somehow survives, it proclaims: this is what is in peril, this is what we must save. Genesis is Sebastião Salgado’s third long-term exploration of global issues, following Workers and Migrations, his examinations of the human toll wrought by radical economic and social change. This time, he is addressing our natural environment in offering a love poem in images to the majesty and fragility of our planet. The images are presented in five geographic areas: the south hemisphere, natural sanctuaries, Africa, the north hemisphere and the Amazon. On the occasion of the exhibition, a book will be published by Taschen.

Paolo Woods: StateSince 2010, Paolo Woods lives in Haiti, a nation particularly proud of its history, language and culture, but whose State is virtually bankrupt. The exhibition State considers these fundamental questions: what happens when a government fails to provide its people with basic services? What constitutes the genuine identity of a people tossed from one crisis to the next? From local entre-preneurs to the prevarications of NGOs, from the buzzing world of radio to the conquest of American Protestantism, State is an uncompromising quest into what journalism rarely shows of Haiti: the construction of an imagination that fleshes out the real and an inextinguishable desire for coherence.

Sebastiao Salgado, The Anavilhanas, Río Negro, Bazsil, 2009 © Sebastiao Salgado / Amazonas imagesPaolo Woods, Pascale Théard, Port-au-Prince, Haiti, 2010 © Paolo Woods

10/13Press packLaure Albin Guillot

The following images are available for the pressThe reproduction and representation of the images in the following section is authorised and free of rights within the sole framework of the promotion of the exhibition and during its duration.

Special conditions:- up to five photographs bearing the copyright © Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet.- presentation on Internet sites must not exceed 72 dpi.- the photograph LAG 19 is free of rights for a reproduction not exceeding a quarter interior page.Please contact us for all specific requirements.

To download the images: ftp://84.16.80.83/web/press/Laure_Albin_GuillotUsername: pressPassword: 1006_mel_13

LAG 04Jean Cocteau, 1939Private collection, Paris© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

LAG 05Louis Jouvet, ca 1925Collections Roger-Viollet / Parisienne de Photographie© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

LAG 06Micrography, ca 1929Private collection, Paris© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

LAG 07Micrography, Ash Tree Bud (section), ca 1931Collection société française de photographie© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

LAG 08Micrography, ca 1929Collections Roger-Viollet / Parisienne de Photographie© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

LAG 03Untitled, ca 1937Collection Musée Nicéphore Niépce, Ville de Chalon-sur-Saône

LAG 01Illustration for Narcisse by Paul Valéry, 1936Private collection, Paris© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

LAG 02Lucienne Boyer, ca 1935Collections Roger-Viollet / Parisienne de Photographie© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

LAG 09Micrography, Hippuric Acid, ca 1931Collection société française de photographie© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

LAG 10Advertisement for the vaccine-cream Salantale, ca 1942Bibliothèque nationale de France

11/13Press packLaure Albin Guillot

LAG 17Nude Study, ca 1940Collections Roger-Viollet / Parisienne de Photographie© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

LAG 12Off-print for the Mayoly-Spindler labo-ratory, Paris, ca 1940Pivate collection, Paris

LAG 11Advertisement study, undatedCollection Musée Nicéphore Niépce,Ville de Chalon-sur-Saône

LAG 18Nude Study, 1939Bibliothèque nationale de France© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

LAG 13Print for F. Marquis chocolate makerand confectioner, Paris, undatedPrivate collection, Paris

LAG 14Hubert de Givenchy, 1948Collections Roger-Viollet / Parisienne de Photographie© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet


LAG 20Les tierces alternées, illustration for Les préludes de Claude Debussy, 1948Musée français de la photographie /Conseil général de l’Essonne, Benoît Chain© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet

LAG 15Advertisement for the Manufacture Jaeger-LeCoultre, ca 1940Private collection, Paris


LAG 21Untitled, ca 1935-1940Collection du Centre Pompidou, MNAM-CCI, Paris, 2012Centre Pompidou, MNAM-CCI, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais

LAG 22Selfportrait, ca 1935Collection Musée Nicéphore Niépce, Ville de Chalon-sur-Saône© Laure Albin Guillot / Roger-Viollet


The Musée de l’Elysée

MissionThe Musée de l’Elysée is one of the world’s leading museums entirely dedicated to photography. Since its establishment in 1985, it has improved public understanding of photography through innovative exhibitions, key publications and engaging events. Recognised as a centre of expertise in the field of conservation and enhancement of visual heritage, it holds a unique collection of more than 100,000 prints and preserves several photographical archives, in particular those of Ella Maillart, Nicolas Bouvier and Charlie Chaplin. By supporting young photographers, offering new perspectives on the masters and confronting photography with other art forms, the Musée de l’Elysée experiments with the image.Based in Switzerland, it presents four major exhibitions in Lausanne each year and an average of fifteen in prestigious museums and festivals around the world. Regional by character and international in scope, it seeks to constantly develop new and exciting ways to interact with audiences and collaborate with other institutions.

Education The Musée de l’Elysée is deeply invested in educational programs aimed at sharing our passion for photography and its fascinating history with youth. A number of workshops and talks are scheduled throughout the year for children of all ages to explore the world of photography. The introductory courses and workshops are designed for children of 6-12 years. Additionally, the museum hosts regular conferences on the subject of photography with guest artists and museum collaborators.

Bookstore and Café EliseWith over 800 titles on photography and art, the museum’s bookstore is one of the most complete in Switzerland. The Café Elise welcomes visitors in a meeting space enabling artistic exchange in an agreeable way.

Carte Elysée The Carte Elysée provides its members with many advantages, among which free admission to a number of institutionsspecializing in photography in Switzerland or abroad.

View of the Musée de l’Elysée © Yves AndréView of a workshop for children at the Musée de l’ElyséeView of the Café Elise and the library of the Musée de l’Elysée


Practical Information

Address of the Musée de l’Elysée18, avenue de l’ElyséeCH - 1014 LausanneT + 41 21 316 99 11F + 41 21 316 99 12www.elysee.ch

The museum has a Facebook and a Twitter page.

Opening HoursTuesday - Sunday, 11am - 6pmClosed Monday, except for bank holidays

Admission FeeAdults CHF 8.00AVS CHF 6.00Students / Apprentices / AC / AI CHF 4.00Free entry for those under 16Free entry on the first Saturday of the month

Documents

Laure Albin Guillot (1879–1962), The Question of ... · Laure Albin Guillot (1879–1962), The Question of Classicism Exhibition from 5 June to 1 September 2013 Press pack