Marc CHIASSAI

Art(s) : Sculpture.
Mouvement(s) : Various.

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14730 GIBERVILLE
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Criticism

After the great quarrel between figuration and abstraction in the mid-20th century, finding a new path and new archetypes became an absolute necessity. The great upheavals in visual practices that marked the 1960s, particularly in the United States, transformed sculpture into a form of grating and showy caricature, using new materials and moulds, everyday objects, showy performances and Body-art, all of which have been responsible for deconsecrating the artform. And yet, certain sculptors have refused to succumb to this form of unbridled creation by deliberately seeking to expand tradition. This is the case with Marc Chiassaï, a Frenchman of Tuscan origin based in Normandy, who succeeds in breathing life into stone and making it quiver with his emotions, and who exhibits his work regularly in France and Italy. As a result of his personal research, Marc Chiassaï has initiated a long reflection on the problem of reproducing reality in art, which has without a doubt deeply influenced his work. The artist practices direct carving, a technique very dear to great sculptors, chiefly using Caen limestone, which is very light in colour and has been renowned since the 19th century, yet he readily incorporates different materials in his works (pebbles, black limestone, wood and so on). His sources of inspiration include the synthetism of Gauguin in terms of the simplification of shapes, analytical cubism for skilfully reassembling what he deconstructs, and the Dada iconoclasm of Hans Arp for creating his formal abstractions, not forgetting the novel biomorphism of Henry Moore. While Marc Chiassaï reappropriates the world by projecting himself into space, he does not attempt to copy nature or reproduce life. He very powerfully communicates the essence of these things, since no shape could exist unless it carried meaning. Simple and austere, his sculptures in the round are dynamic, fluid and elegant, their lines pure, and their surfaces smooth and sensual. Their sobriety expresses a formal beauty, a value that has been so jeopardised in contemporary art, and which he attains thanks to his quest for a delicate balance between volume and the rhythm of lines and voluptuous curves. The work that Marc Chiassaï offers is perfectly coherent. Timeless, it is in line with the sculptural tradition. It conveys a lively energy as a result of the complicity between the artist and his material, material which he invests in order to demonstrate his desire for spiritual and no doubt symbolic affirmation. Born of the fertile imagination of their author, and impressive in terms of the overall harmony that they convey, these sculptures allow the spectator to identify with them, and, if not to fathom their mystery, at least to feel real emotion.

Francine BUNEL-MALRAS, Historian of Art