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Edouard Pignon

"Painting does not mean anything, it just wants to be."

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Notes of biography

Edouard Pignon is born in 1905 in Bully-les-Mines (Pas-de-Calais, France). His childhood is difficult; he works in a mine, then in a plant from 1920 to 1927. He moves to Paris in 1927 and begins his studies at the Applied Arts School and in the Labour University.
His first solo exhibition is held in 1939 (Paris). Edouard Pignon joins the Communist Party in 1933. He is a resistance member during the Second World War. With Bazaine, Esteve, Lapicque, Le Moal and Manessier, Pignon is one of "Twenty painters of French tradition", who exhibits in Paris at the Braun Galery in 1941.
Throughout his career, Edouard Pignon practices a resolutely figurative painting, blaming abstract art to suppress the reality. The subjects of his paintings often evoke his political commitment, however, without practicing "socialist realism". Pignon declines his pictorial work in series (the rooster fights, the pushers of wheat, Divers, The large red bares, etc.), paintings, watercolors, giant ceramics-sculptures.
Man of character who wants to be free, Edouard Pignon, a friend of Picasso, married to the art critic Helen Parmelin, constantly refuses any commitment to any movement or academy. Artist always against the stream, primarily a colorist, his work is present in most major museums in France and abroad.
Edouard Pignon dies in 1993 in La Couture-Boussey (France). To help create a museum in Marles-les-Mines, Edouard Pignon donates forty of his paintings, drawings and lithographs, as well as works by his friend Picasso (In 1951-1952, Picasso and Pignon shared a workshop in Vallauris).

Artists on display

The art and the artists display: proclamations, galleries, museums, personal or collective exhibitions. On walls or in shop windows, wise or rebels, posters warn, argue, show. Some were specially conceived by an artist for such or such event, other, colder, have only the letter.

Some were created in lithographic technic, most are simple offset reproductions. They are many those who like collecting these rectangles of paper, monochrome or in games of colours, in matt paper or brilliant, with many words or almost dumb.

We are happy also to be able to greet, by this pages, mythical galleries as those of Denise René, Louis Carré, Claude Bernard, Berheim Jeune, Maeght, Pierre Loeb and others.

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Complete work(s)

Complete work(s)
All the complete works

Bibliographic track and more

To read about the artist :
  • « E. Pignon », H. Lefebvre, Le Musée de Poche, Ed. Georges Fall, 1956, rééd 1970
  • « Pignon, touches en zigzag pour un portrait », H. Parmelin, Marval, 1987
  • « Pignon en majesté », J.-L. Ferrier, Marval, 1990
  • « Edouard Pignon », P. Bouchet, RMN, Paris, 1997
  • « Edouard Pignon, rétrospective », cat. d'expo., Ed. Palais des beaux-arts de Lille, 1997
  • « Edouard Pignon en pleine lumière », P. Bouchet, Mady Ménier, Ed. Actes Sud, 1999
  • « Edouard Pignon », P. Bouchet, Ed. Ides et Calendes, Neuchâtel, 2004
  • « E. P., du rythme entre les choses », coll., cat. d'expositions, Somogy Ed. d’art, 2005
  • « Edouard Pignon », P. Bouchet, coll. Découvrons l'art, Ed. Cercle d'Art, 2007
  • «  Nu rouge », Frédéric Touchard, Ed. Arléa, Paris, 2012
To read from the artist :
  • « Contre-courant », Jean-Louis Ferrier, Stock, 1974
  • « Genèse d'un tableau », interview H. Parmelin, Ed. Galerie Beaubourg, 1984
Website :
www.edouardpignon.com/

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Art movements

+ SOCIAL REALISM / 1920-1950 / André Fougeron, Otto Griebel, Amédée de la Patellière, etc.
All art movements

See & discover

Beyond works currently in stock, it seemed to me useful to combine business with pleasure by letting you discover others works by artists in my gallery. These artworks, now sold or removed from our website, have been in our stock in the past.

These pages will undoubtedly make it possible for some of you to associate an image with its title or the other way round, for others it will be a good time to discover more on such and such artist. For the sake of confidentiality – the pieces being no longer available – we won't display neither their numbering or their price. For whatever reason, make sure to visit this amazing art database with to date 6441 online works just for your pleasure! Michelle Champetier

See & discover