Bernard Buffet

Bernard Buffet (10 July 1928 – 4 October 1999) was a French painter, printmaker, and sculptor. An extremely prolific artist, he produced a varied and extensive body of work. His style was exclusively figurative and is often classified as Expressionist or "miserabilist". Quotes Courbet was the painter for me. Written statement (1993), cited in Alexander Roob, "Bernard Buffet: Terrain Vague – Terrain Dangereux", in Bernard Buffet. Maler / Painter / Peintre, Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt / Walther König (2008), p. 24. ISBN 978-3-86560-490-3 I do not like artists, artists are imbeciles. I only like painters. Quoted in Éric Troncy, "Je t'aime… moi non plus", in Bernard Buffet. Maler / Painter / Peintre, Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt / Walther König (2008), p. 226. ISBN 978-3-86560-490-3 From Tuesday 16th October work (manually) for at least 4 to 5 hours a day and every day – do not fail under any pretext – and never stop working mentally. Contemplative meditation every morning, every afternoon, every evening. Do not fail under any pretext. Do not accept useless moments under any pretext (voluntary ones are acceptable). Summarize the day every evening. Do not let the mind be shaken. Personal notebook entry (16 October 1945), cited in Éric Troncy, Bernard Buffet. Maler / Painter / Peintre, Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt / Walther König (2008), p. 227. ISBN 978-3-86560-490-3 Quotes about Buffet Eduardo Arroyo I never met him, but I was certain he was an authentic painter who decisively expressed suffering and was himself a victim of it, which was why I fiercely defended him against the proponents of abstraction from the School of Paris who attacked him. Unpublished manuscript (1980s), published in Fabrice Hergott & Dominique Gagneux (eds.), Bernard Buffet: Rétrospective, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris / Paris Musées (2016), p. 242. ISBN 978-2-7596-0331-2 Pierre Bergé Jean Cocteau claimed that a painter always paints his own portrait, even in a landscape or a still life. This was particularly true for Buffet. He looked like his canvases. The hanging chickens—that was him; the pitiful herrings—that was him; the cypresses stripped bare by the mistral wind—that was still him; the angel of death hovering over a field of ruins—that was always him. "He Was 21 and I Was 19", in Bernard Buffet: Rétrospective, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris / Paris Musées (2016), p. 41. ISBN 978-2-7596-0331-2 Jean Cocteau Pain painted with joy. Guestbook inscription, Galerie Drouant-David (4 February 1955), published in Le Passé défini, Journal, Vol. IV, Gallimard (1955); reprinted in Bernard Buffet: Rétrospective, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (2016), p. 49. [Buffet] never engages in that awful battle the way Picasso does, for he mainly presents the duel with himself. Diary entry (December 1957), cited in Alexander Roob, Bernard Buffet. Maler / Painter / Peintre, Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt / Walther König (2008), p. 25. ISBN 978-3-86560-490-3 Wolf traps set by a child's handBecause it sought (beneath our blackened sun)With barbed wire to gather your sweet briarsBleeds Eve with the watering-can-rose hair.Could it be that from the heavens a reed instrumentStretches a semblance of lilies of song across the foldaway bedAnd that a medieval, broad-hipped EveDeparts an Eden garden prey to savage hounds?After the bit between the teeth, what remains to be taken?Perhaps the phantom armchair where they seat meThe shadow of a pitcher's spout across the map of tender loveThe harlequin hitchhiking of the steel pylons.May his faithful friend know me from afarBernard the Executioner, pensive, leaning upon his ax. Hommage à Bernard Buffet – Gisant debout [Homage to Bernard Buffet – Recumbent Effigy Standing], Sils Maria (July 1955); published in the exhibition catalogue for Galerie Lucien Blanc, Aix-en-Provence (July 1955); reprinted in Bernard Buffet: Rétrospective, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (2016), p. 49. ISBN 978-2-7596-0331-2 Original French: Pièges à loups que pose une main enfantineParce qu’elle voulut (sous notre soleil noir)Fil de fer barbelé cueillir vos églantinesSaigne l’Ève aux cheveux de pomme d’arrosoir.Se peut-il que du ciel un instrument à ancheDans le lit-cage allonge un semble-lys des chantsEt que médiévale une Ève aux larges hanchesQuitte un jardin Éden en proie aux chiens méchants ?Après le mort aux dents que reste-t-il à prendre ?Peut-être le fauteuil fantôme où l’on m’assiedL’ombre d’un bec de broc sur la carte du tendreL’auto-stop arlequin des pylônes d’acier.Que son fidèle ami lointainement me sacheBernard Bourreau pensif accoudé sur sa hache. Otto Hahn For twenty years I did not review Bernard Buffet, and I didn't go to see his annual exhibitions. Because one is subject to the atmosphere, because he exhibited on Avenue Matignon, and not in Saint-Germain-des-Prés or Beaubourg, and Avenue Matignon has a reputation as a moneyed milieu. There is pressure, a moral terrorism... Interview (1998), cited in Éric Troncy, Bernard Buffet. Maler / Painter / Peintre (2008), p. 226, and Bernard Buffet: Rétrospective (2016), p. 227. ISBN 978-3-86560-490-3 Claude Roger-Marx The silence of these monochrome compositions, and the authority with which matte blacks, saffrons, and pale pinks played among cold, chalky tones, revealed a true visual artist outside coteries and fashion. "Buffet and Lorjou Demonstrate What True Young Painting Is", Le Figaro littéraire (24 July 1948); reprinted in Bernard Buffet: Rétrospective, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (2016), p. 75. ISBN 978-2-7596-0331-2 Kiichiro Okano I had just been demobilized and sent home from the war, and I remember standing still in front of his paintings, deeply moved and astonished, admiring the sharp and original shapes and lines, the gloomy colors and the dominant black, white and gray; the truculence, the keenness, the deep sorrow and the dry emptiness pervading his work. Rusty silence and poetry. There I saw accusation of and provocation against the devastated post-war French society. His paintings instilled a ray of hope in the void and stupor oppressing our generation after the defeat. France, a country which repeatedly had been a battlefield, which suffered the Occupation, and where fellow citizens killed each other. I was awed by the fact that a young genius with such sensibility and ability had been born in the apocalyptic context of World War II. His art undoubtedly was a new dawn, which overcame the melancholy in my mind. Since then, I have been a captive of Buffet. His paintings showed me a light, and a new road, and his paintings only could do that as I had no religion. This is how my ardent admiration for Buffet started. Kiichiro Okano, "Buffet and I" (April 1978), as cited in the Bernard Buffet Museum Facility Guide. Andy Warhol Andy Warhol: But the French do really have one good painter, I mean, my favourite artist would be the last big artist in Paris. What’s his name? Benjamin Buchloh: A painter? Warhol: Yes, the last famous painter. Buffet … I don’t see any difference between that and Giacometti. Somewhere along the line, people decided that it was commercial or whatever it was. But he’s still painting, and I still see the things; the prices are still $20,000 to $30,000. He could still be there. His work is good; his technique is really good; he’s as good as the other French guy who just died a couple of days ago, Dubuffet. What do you think has happened? Do you think it is not that good? Interview with Benjamin H. D. Buchloh (1985), published in Andy Warhol, edited by Annette Michelson (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2001), pp. 119–128; cited in Laurie Benson, "The Last Big Artist in Paris: Bernard Buffet", National Gallery of Victoria. Georges Mathieu ...and if I haven't mentioned Lorjou or Buffet, it is simply because they do not count in the evolution of painting. Statement (1960), cited in Lydia Harambourg, "Bernard Buffet — Georges Mathieu: Between Myth and Modernity", in Bernard Buffet: Rétrospective, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (2016), p. 161. 978-2-7596-0331-2 [Bernard Buffet is] the great figurative painter of the 20th century. Statement made in his later years, cited in Lydia Harambourg, "Bernard Buffet — Georges Mathieu: Between Myth and Modernity", in Bernard Buffet: Rétrospective, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (2016), p. 161. 978-2-7596-0331-2 Maurice Druon [Bernard Buffet's art possesses a] human and inhuman aspect... an intransigence that can be both selfish and generous at the same time. Cited by Dominique Gagneux in "Bernard Buffet: The Oxymoron, or the Paradoxes of a Painter", in Fabrice Hergott & Dominique Gagneux (eds.), Bernard Buffet: Rétrospective, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris / Paris Musées (2016), p. 15. ISBN 978-2-7596-0331-2 External links Official Bernard Buffet Estate website Bernard Buffet Museum (Surugadaira, Japan) "The Last Big Artist in Paris: Bernard Buffet" – Essay by Laurie Benson at the National Gallery of Victoria Category:1928 births Category:1999 deaths Category:Painters from France Category:Sculptors from France Category:Printmakers