OLIVIER DEBRÉ

The authenticity of this work has been confirmed by Ms. Sylvie Debré-Huerre, Paris, 24 March 2021. This work will be included in the forthcoming catalogue raisonné. We thank Ms. Debré-Huerre for her kind support.

Provenance: Private collection Switzerland.

"For me, making a painting is not at all about creating an object, but is a kind of event that can be translated by an object." Olivier Debré

A visit to the 1937 World Fair in Paris where he saw Picasso's "Guernica" opened Olivier Debré's eyes to abstract art. After attending a few architecture lectures and graduating in history from the Sorbonne in 1942, he dedicated himself entirely to abstract painting in 1943.

His works are classified as colour field painting. While they still followed a strict, formal structure in the 1950s, they became freer in design in the following decade, and then achieved a formal balance in terms of composition in the 1970s.

In addition to paintings, he created public artworks, especially in the 1980s. He designed stage curtains for the Comédie Français and the Shangai Opera, to name but two. In the first half of the 1980s, he accepted an appointment at the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts in Paris.