JACQUES LAGRANGE 1917/1995

OIL ON CANVAS DATED 57. FIGURES AT THE CLIFFS. 38X46CM

Jacques Lagrange entered the École nationale des arts décoratifs in 1933 and attended the engraving workshop at the École des beaux-arts in Paris. In 1937, he worked with Raoul Dufy to decorate the Electricity Pavilion at the Paris International Exhibition. Mobilized to Angers, he discovered the Apocalypse Tapestry.

Liberated and demobilized in 1944, Lagrange returned to his studio in Arcueil. Invited to the first Salon de Mai in 1945, he participated every year thereafter, exhibiting at Myriam Prévot and Gildo Caputo's Galerie de France in 1946 and 1953. Fulfilling a long-standing project, he moved to Aubusson, where he made his first tapestries in direct contact with the craftsmen. From 1955, his paintings were regularly exhibited by the Villand et Galanis gallery, alongside those of Roger Chastel, Maurice Estève and Charles Lapicque.

Jacques Lagrange was co-writer of Les Vacances de monsieur Hulot (1953), Mon oncle (1958), Playtime (1967), Trafic (1971) and Parade (1974) by Jacques Tati, whom he met in 1945 and with whom he continued to collaborate as artistic advisor until his death in 1982. He also worked with Jean Vilar, creating the sets and costumes for Ubu for the TNP in 1958.

Lagrange created several monumental works for architect Édouard Albert, including a 600 m2 ceiling for the Croulebarbe Tower, also known as the Albert Tower (1957-1959), the first skyscraper in Paris, and a marble pavement (1967-1972) for the Jussieu Faculty of Science, for which Jean Lescure provided the epigraphy (Einstein formula, Baudelaire verse, Gaston Bachelard phrase).The creator of numerous tapestry cartoons, Lagrange is a professor at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris.
From 1967 to 1992, he lived in the village of Saint-Martial-le-Mont in the Creuse département.

Ref: CV624V10O9