Fine Art Registry™ Art Book List and Reviews
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Camille Fauré:
Impossible Objects
by Cork Marcheschi
Website: www.camillefaure.com
Published by Umbra Books, hardcover 172 p. (Jan 2007)
Price: $50.00 (Autographed by Writer)
About the Book
A new, authoritative monograph on a never before covered subject: Atelier Fauré is the last Art Deco studio of note to receive the attention it deserves. |
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From the Author:
"Studio Fauré did not build on the past: it created a moment that would be unique to the point that it could not be copied. The finest pieces of Fauré work rival any of the Art Deco masters and outdo them on the grounds of bold originality, fearless experimentation and an integration of the modern art of its day." —
Cork Marcheschi
...Read More (PDF)
This new book by Cork Marcheschi is notable for a number of reasons:
- The author’s refreshing style of writing which reveals his own passion for the subject. A narrative and personal style which will involve the reader in the fascinating story of a studio which has been parked on the sidelines for too long.
- Beautiful, in depth photographic coverage of the stars of the piece: the bold and fearless enamel vases which were the most important output of the studio.
- Facts and figures which are of great value to the history of 20th century art and to the collector.
- Details of enameling techniques which have been buried along with the masters whodeveloped and practiced them.
WARNING:
This is NOT a “booklet” on the Fauré studio. This is the real thing.
- 172 pages on thick, art paper, full color throughout, hardback.
- More than 400 color photos, most of them new photos shot on assignment in Limoges, Alsace, Paris and Florida, showing collections not previously photographed. Also photos of many original sketches not generally available even in museums. Old photos of the studio meticulously restored. Photos of beautiful Fauré pieces from many museums and collections around the world.
- Sidebars on the copper forms, metal spinning, plus charts showing how many vases were produced of what shape and size.
- Insights into the proprietary Fauré enameling procedure, some of which is no longer known by anyone in the world.
- Art history information which places the work in a wider context. Valuable insight into the Art Deco period.
- Live, interested, passionate narration and commentary from an author who has been researching the Fauré studio for over 30 years and who knows how to teach art in a captivating, unpretentious way.
- Valuable information and tips for collectors and would-be collectors.
About the Author:
Cork Marcheschi is a San Francisco native who has been involved in the fine arts and music scene for over 40 years. He has taught sculpture, critical studies and art history at the University of California at Berkley, the San Francisco Art Institute and the Minneapolis College of Art. He has had over 130 solo art exhibitions throughout the world. He has 50 public sculptures littered about the American landscape. He has collected and studied Art Deco and American and European art pottery for 35 years.His artwork can be seen on his web site:
www.corkmarcheschi.com
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Book Reviews
By Dan Koon
San Francisco sculptor Cork Marcheschi has taken a break from his light and motion inspired public art projects to indulge his long fascination with Art Deco objects and produced a book valuable on many levels. Ostensibly written for an admittedly narrow audience, collectors, the hundreds of richly colored photographs, many of them full page, immediately lend the book a far wider appeal. Anyone flipping through the pages will be amazed by the beauty of the art which is the focus here, enamel Art Deco vases produced by the French studio of Camille Fauré over a seventy year period beginning in the 1920s.
But don't expect an academic treatment here. For truly astounding is the story Mr. Marcheschi relates about how these pieces were produced, and thus his apt inclusion of the words “Impossible Objects” in the book's title. For it is his contention that vases of the kind and beauty turned out by Atelier Fauré can no longer be produced anywhere.
So this, then, is also the story of a technology which has now become lost. Much like various forms of heavier-than-air flight developed in the early years of aviation or steam powered automobiles that vanished from American roadways shortly after World War I (thank you, Standard Oil), here is the story of how enamel vases of singularly spectacular luminosity and design were produced by the artisans of a single studio in the porcelain and enamelware producing center of Limoges, artisans who possessed a special know-how that died with them.
The reader is given a hands on treatment of the subject by a man who works with his hands and who has an abiding love for his subject. The fact that Mr. Marcheschi also possesses impressive academic credentials, having taught at the University of California Berkeley, San Francisco Art Institute and Minneapolis College of Art, only broadens the book's appeal because he is able to provide the unique context of the Fauré studio within the evolution of modern art in the first half of the 20th Century. Camille Fauré's daughter, Andrée, was chief designer in the studio, and found herself caught up in the spirit of artistic revolution of the times. Yet, owing to Limoges' distance from Paris, she was free from the chichi arbiters of artistic taste and could incorporate into her work elements of the Italian Futurists, Analytical Cubists, Russian Suprematists and artists of the Parisian school, notably Fernand Leger, Robert and Sonia Delaunay and Kandinsky. (A somewhat incredible accomplishment in itself, since the industry of Limoges, artistically, mainly followed the tradition of what was commercially successful.)
Mr. Marcheschi succeeds in making his point about the impossibility of reduplicating a Fauré vase today with a well researched exposition of the studio and its artisans, led by Alexandre Marty who possessed an intuitive skill for building up layer upon layer of enamel (up to half an inch thick in places) while retaining well defined edges and peaks and luminosity.
One can imagine the fascination an accomplished artist would find in delving into the technology of Atelier Fauré and Mr. Marcheschi does not disappoint in the retelling. The appreciation one gains for the skill involved in making the artworks pictured throughout is yet another appeal of Impossible Objects.
Add in the nonformulaic twists and turns the book takes, interesting sidebars on related aspects of vase production, the inclusion of Mr. Marcheschi's critique of the totality of Atelier Fauré's output throughout the lifetime of the studio (it closed its doors for the last time in 1994) and a well informed discussion of how to assess the value of a Fauré piece and where to find them on the market, readers of any inclination should find much to interest, entertain and, harking back once more to the well-chosen impossible from the title, simply to look at with wonder.
One hopes the book will find its way into the hands of a new generation of enamelists who become inspired by this dramatic legacy of the Fauré studio (photographed principally by David Phillips from the finest collections of Fauré vases in Europe and America) to undertake the challenge of recovering this technology. Should that day arrive, Cork Marcheschi will have succeeded in writing a book destined for an important place in the history of art. For the time being he can content himself with having admirably accomplished his intent—to share his delight with an underappreciated body of work from an exciting period in the development of modern art.
by Dan Koon | December 13, 2006
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