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André Masson

 
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André Masson
 
 
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André-Aimé-René Masson(January 4, 1896 – October 28, 1987) was a French
France

France , officially the French Republic , is a country whose Metropolitan France is located in Western Europe and that also comprises various Overseas departments and territories of France....
 artist
Artist

The definition of an artist is wide-ranging and covers a broad spectrum of activities to do with creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art....
.

Masson was born in Balagny-sur-Thérain
Balagny-sur-Thérain

Balagny-sur-Th?rain is a Communes of France in the Oise Departments of France in northern France....
, near Senlis in Picardy, but was brought up in Belgium
Belgium

* A small German-speaking Community of Belgium exists in eastern Wallonia. Belgium's linguistic diversity and related political and cultural conflicts are reflected in the history of Belgium and a complex Communities and regions of Belgium....
. He studied art in Brussels
Brussels

Brussels , officially the Brussels Capital-Region, is the de facto capital city of the European Union and the largest urban area in Belgium....
 and Paris
Paris

Paris is the Capital of France and the country's largest city. It is situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the ?le-de-France Regions of France ....
. He fought for France in World War I
World War I

World War I, or the First World War , was a global military conflict which involved the Great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War I and the Central Powers....
 and was seriously injured.

Masson's early works display an interest in cubism
Cubism

Cubism was a 20th century avant-garde art movement, pioneered by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque, that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music and literature....
.






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Pedestal Table in the Studio
André-Aimé-René Masson(January 4, 1896 – October 28, 1987) was a French
France

France , officially the French Republic , is a country whose Metropolitan France is located in Western Europe and that also comprises various Overseas departments and territories of France....
 artist
Artist

The definition of an artist is wide-ranging and covers a broad spectrum of activities to do with creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art....
.

Masson was born in Balagny-sur-Thérain
Balagny-sur-Thérain

Balagny-sur-Th?rain is a Communes of France in the Oise Departments of France in northern France....
, near Senlis in Picardy, but was brought up in Belgium
Belgium

* A small German-speaking Community of Belgium exists in eastern Wallonia. Belgium's linguistic diversity and related political and cultural conflicts are reflected in the history of Belgium and a complex Communities and regions of Belgium....
. He studied art in Brussels
Brussels

Brussels , officially the Brussels Capital-Region, is the de facto capital city of the European Union and the largest urban area in Belgium....
 and Paris
Paris

Paris is the Capital of France and the country's largest city. It is situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the ?le-de-France Regions of France ....
. He fought for France in World War I
World War I

World War I, or the First World War , was a global military conflict which involved the Great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War I and the Central Powers....
 and was seriously injured.

Masson's early works display an interest in cubism
Cubism

Cubism was a 20th century avant-garde art movement, pioneered by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque, that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music and literature....
. He later became associated with surrealism
Surrealism

Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early-1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
, and he was one of the most enthusiastic employers of automatic drawing, making a number of automatic works in pen and ink. Masson would often force himself to work under strict conditions, for example, after long periods of time without food or sleep, or under the influence of drugs. He believed forcing himself into a reduced state of consciousness would help his art be free from rational control, and hence get closer to the workings of his subconscious mind.

From around 1926 he experimented by throwing sand and glue onto canvas and making oil paintings based around the shapes that formed. By the end of the 1920s, however, he was finding automatism rather restricting, and he left the surrealist movement and turned instead to a more structured style, often producing works with a violent or erotic theme, and making a number of paintings in reaction to the Spanish Civil War
Spanish Civil War

The Spanish Civil War was a major conflict in Spain that started after an attempted coup d'?tat by a group of Spanish Army generals, supported by the conservative Spanish Confederation of the Autonomous Right , Carlist groups and the fascistic Falange, against the government of the Second Spanish Republic, then under the leadership of pr...
 (he associated once more with the surrealists at the end of the 1930s).

André Masson drew the cover of the first issue of Georges Bataille
Georges Bataille

Georges Bataille was a French people writer. Although subsequent philosophers have been significantly influenced by his thought, Bataille tended not to refer to himself as a philosophy....
's review, Acéphale
Acéphale

Ac?phale designates both a public review created by Georges Bataille and a secret society and esoteric society formed by Bataille and some other members who had sworn to keep silence....
, in 1936, and participated in all its issues until 1939.

Under the German
Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany and the Third Reich are the colloquial English names for Germany under the regime of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party , which established a Totalitarianism dictatorship that existed from 1933 to 1945....
 occupation of France
Vichy France

Vichy France, or the Vichy regime are the common terms used to describe the government of France from July 1940 to August 1944. This government, which succeeded the French Third Republic, officially called itself the French State , in contrast with the previous designation, "French Republic." Marshal of France Philippe P?tain pro...
 during World War II
World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
, his work was condemned by the Nazis as degenerate
Degenerate art

Degenerate art is the English translation of the German language entartete Kunst, a term adopted by the Nazi regime in Germany to describe virtually all modern art....
. With the assistance of Varian Fry
Varian Fry

Varian Mackey Fry was a Taft School and Harvard University educated American journalist who ran a rescue network in Vichy France that helped approximately 2,000 to 4,000 anti-Nazi and Jewish refugees to escape Nazi Germany and the Holocaust....
 in Marseille
Marseille

"Marseille" is the second-largest city of France and forms the third-largest aire urbaine, after those of Paris and Lyon, with a population recorded to be 1,516,340 at the 1999 census and estimated to be 1,605,000 in 2007....
, Masson escaped the Nazi regime on a ship to the French island of Martinique
Martinique

Martinique is an island in the eastern Caribbean Sea, having a land area of 1,128 km?. It is an overseas department of France. To the northwest lies Dominica, to the south St Lucia....
 from where he went on to the United States
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
. Upon arrival in New York City
New York City

The City of New York is the List of United States cities by population in the United States, while the New York metropolitan area ranks among the List of urban areas by population....
, U.S. customs officials inspecting Masson's luggage found a cache of his erotic drawings. Denouncing them as pornographic, they ripped them up before the artist's eyes.

Living in New Preston, Connecticut
New Preston, Connecticut

New Preston is a rural village and census-designated place in the New England town of Washington, Connecticut in Litchfield County, Connecticut, Connecticut, United States....
 his work became an important influence on American abstract expressionists. Following the war, he returned to France and settled in Aix-en-Provence
Aix-en-Provence

Aix or Aix-en-Provence , to distinguish it from other cities built over hot springs, is a communes of France in southern France, some north of Marseille....
 where he painted a number of landscape
Landscape art

Landscape art depicts scenery such as mountains, valleys, trees, rivers, and forests. Sky is almost always included in the view, and weather usually is an element of the composition....
s.

Trivia

Masson's brother in law, the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan
Jacques Lacan

Jacques-Marie-?mile Lacan was a France psychoanalyst and psychiatrist who made prominent contributions to psychoanalysis, philosophy, and literary theory....
, was the last private owner of Gustave Courbet
Gustave Courbet

Jean D?sir? Gustave Courbet was a France Painting who led the realism movement in 19th-century French painting....
's provocative painting L'Origine du monde
L'Origine du monde

L?Origine du monde is an oil on canvas painted by Gustave Courbet in 1866. Measuring about 46 cm by 55 cm , it depicts the close-up view of the genitals and abdomen of a naked woman, lying on a bed and spreading her legs....
  (The Origin of the World); Lacan asked Masson to paint a surrealist
Surrealism

Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early-1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
 variant.

Bibliography

  • Buchholz, Kai & Wolbert, Klaus (Hg.): André Masson. Bilder aus dem Labyrinth der Seele. Frankfurt a. M. 2003.
  • Kaiser-Strohmann, Dagmar. Vom Aufruhr zur Struktur. Schriftwerte im Informel, Exhibition Catalogue, Gustav-Luebcke-Museum Hamm 2008, ISBN 3-9807898-6-1
  • Mueller-Yao, Marguerite Hui: Der Einfluss der Kunst der chinesischen Kalligraphie auf die westliche informelle Malerei, Diss. Bonn, Koeln 1985. ISBN 3-88375-051-4
  • Mueller-Yao, Marguerite: Informelle Malerei und chinesische Kalligrafie, in: Informel, Begegnung und Wandel, (hrsg von Heinz Althoefer, Schriftenreihe des Museums am Ostwall; Bd. 2), Dortmund 2002, ISBN 3-611-01062-6,
  • Rolf Wedewer: Die Malerei des Informel. Weltverlust und Ich-Behauptung, Deutscher Kunstverlag, Muenchen, 2007. ISBN 3422065601


External links