Pierre Soulages ‘The Creative Power’

“I do not depict. I do not describe. I do not represent. I paint, I present.”

Pierre Soulages.

An exhibition dedicated to the renowned French artist, Pierre Soulages, is currently on display within l’Espace culturel Lympia in Nice, running until the 19 April 2020.

In celebration of the artist’s centenary, the exhibition ‘Pierre Soulages: The Creative Power’, offers a retrospective of the prolific artist and his self-professed ‘Beyond-Black’ works.

Just over 100 works by Soulages on are display, accompanied by accounts of the artist from friends and family, providing a deep insight into the life and work of the renowned painter.

Pierre Soulages (b. 1919, Rodez, France), is best known for his outrenoir, or ‘beyond black’ paintings, first exhibited in 1979 at the Musée national d’art moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, in Paris. These first single-pigment paintings represented the culmination of his study of black, previously used to contrast against other colours. In reducing his palette to black alone, light became the central essence of his painting; the relationships created by black and light, or rather the reflections of light emanating from the black painted surface.

A significant Soulages work titled ‘Peinture 181 x 142.5 cm, 19 mai 2010’, is currently on display at Waddington Custot’s TEFAF Maastricht booth until 15 March 2020.