Given that the longest drive we can have here on Eivissa is no more then
forty-five kilometres, at most, without having to drive back, I have the
feeling that we take a trip around the entire Island when Gary and I go
to visit our international artists.
We
have the unique chance to listen to them talking about their intense
cosmopolitan lives and the way they finally established themselves on
our Island after showing their Art in many countries on several
Continents.
This
is what I was thinking about last Tuesday afternoon, in the pleasant
company of Marcel and Mary Floris, sitting on the terrace of their
house, surrounded by the original garden and forest, with a glass of
tasty and healthy fresh tomato juice that Mary had made and kindly
offered us.
Marcel Floris was born in France in 1914, but he’s lived a good part of
his life in Venezuela, as a director of one of the biggest and best
publicity and commercial-art-design companies in that country. It was
also there where Marcel had his first art-exhibitions by the end of the
1950s and started to be recognised as a very talented creator.
Marcel and Mary arrived to Eivissa in 1971. With the help of Agnete,
from the bar-restaurant “Cana Agnete” of Sant Carles, they found this
little casa payesa, not far from Santa Eulari, and decided to buy
it to make it their own home, adopting also the Island as their new
homeland, where they have been living, successfully and peacefully up to
present.
The
house itself keeps most of its original elements, even the Ibicenco
“good luck blue” in parts of its genuine “sabina roof”, obviously
with the necessary changes, also enlarged with some new rooms, but
keeping the local design, built with the local materials and dry-stone
walls.
It
is like a little museum, full of art and Pre-Columbus archaeology
pieces, in which, the sensitive hand of Mary can be seen in a lot of
details. Mary is a lovely person, a loving wife full of vitality and joy
for life, discreet and clever, with a high artistic feeling; she does
her own artistic works, like her collage that I hope she will decide to
exhibit in future. It will be a real pleasure to be able to write about
them soon. They are both really good people; it was a real pleasure
meeting them, a privilege and honour for any society they bless by their
presence.
In
their finca, they have also built Marcel’s studio and workshop,
of a bigger size then the house, with all the tools and materials
necessary for his creative job.
Being in it, as he was showing it to us, I confessed to him my total
ignorance about most of his works (I only knew the sculpture that he
donated to Eivissa City and some of his things shown in the Museo d’Art
Modern d’Eivissa) as well as his style of Art (Constructivist Art, as I
think it is called).
Marcel, understanding my problem, lent me one of the books about his Art
work, published by the “Galerie Lahumiére” of Paris, in which he
explains his vision of his Art. The following is from this book.
“Not
wishing here to list all my former research work, it was in 1974 that I
practically abandoned metal constructions based on geometrical planes
and the use of mirrors and only retained the lines that delimit them in
order to create transparent volumes and spaces.
“To
achieve this, the materials had to be completely different from those I
had previously used, hence the choice of cables or, even better, elastic
cords that had the advantage of ensuring a permanent rectilinear tension
whatever the atmospheric variations might be.
“My
first achievements were groups of pyramids whose scale and size, two to
three metres high, were substantial enough to allow the viewer to move
about these constructions evoking esoterical associations and feel the
space created by the transparent planes and volumes suggested by simple
straight lines.
“These works have led me to add, with the help of the same cords, in
juxtaposition to the volume, the drawing of a plane on a vertical wall
used as a supporting surface, so that the volume originates on one side
of the plane and, in a way, materialises it.
“This juxtaposition brings about two new factors, one of them being
ambiguity that makes the plane appear, by its extension of the volume,
as if it were a mass in itself, and the other one being the
reversibility produced by the plane drawn in axial perspective.
“The
third logical step consisted in liberating me from the support, namely
the wall, to create autonomous works.
“The
material could no longer be the cord which necessitates one or several
fixed points to tighten it. I therefore returned to the use of metal,
using bars of minor section or diameter to create small-sized works that
would later be designed on a larger scale.
“These later works have given me two additional effects, one being, from
certain angles, the reversibility of the volume joined to the plane, the
other being the transformation of the plane into a simple line when in
profile.
“The
reversibility both of the plane and the volume creates the illusion of a
reciprocating motion completely non-existent in an inert piece of work.
“The
transformation, only by the power of the mind, of the plane into the
volume, the mutations of appearance into reality and reality into
appearance could be interpreted as the concretion, through works of art,
of the multiple subjective interpretations of the verity.
“This research and their guiding lines induced the next works such as
painted-wood relieves where, owing to a particular device used in
assembling the structure, two superimposed parts can create the
impression of a transparency by means of an opaque material.
“These two parts appear as if they were challenging each other to obtain
the predominance of one over the other. This conflict leads to a
simultaneous preponderance whose result is, by this selfsame fact, the
nullification of the precedence and its transformation into imaginary
sensation of transparency.
“These works followed by the linear constructions of painted iron, then
aluminium, with suspended bars freely revolving and swaying by the only
effect of the displacement of air. These works combine a definition of
the inscribed space with the suggestion of a relative space, moving,
apparently traced by the mobile’s suspended bars.
“The
touching of these bars among themselves or against the supporting
surface produces various sounds at extremely variable intervals of
silence, adding a random element of time and transformation.
“The
iron constructions present an ambiguity created by the real angles
joining together the planes suggested by the surrounding lines and the
angles set up on a same plane. As the random transformation and the time
element due to the mobile parts subsist, the sound is practically
non-existent.
“As
a different approach, the designing of mobiles and small-sized
geometrical constructions made of wire mesh which encircle space between
their transparent planes add, by mere shifting movement, the shimmering
effects of a moiré as well as the dematerialization of light effects.
“Throughout these works and those whose creation has been achieved
simultaneously in time, I try to sensitize space, to underline the
changing relations between moving lines, to accentuate the ambiguity of
certain connections between angles, planes, masses and lines, to
integrate sound, time and light, to suggest the virtual movement and
generate the transmutation of realities into appearances. Within this
particular vision of geometry, I try to retrieve a refuge of poetry,
meditation and peace.”
Marcel Floris
June 1984
One Man Shows |
1960 |
Gallery
Foundation Mendoza, Caracas. (VENEZUELA) |
1962 |
Gallery
Motte, Paris. (FRANCE) |
1964 |
Gallery
Bolles, San Francisco, (USA)
Museo de Bellas Artes, Caracas (VENEZULA) |
1966 |
Gallery
Dawson, Dublin, (EIRE) |
1967 |
Museo
de Bellas Artes, Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1968 |
Gallery
Conkright, Caracas (VENEZUELA)
Casa de la Cultura, Maracaibo. (VENEZUELA) |
1969 |
Gallery
Conkright, Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1972 |
Gallery
Van der Voort, Eivissa. (SPAIN)
Gallery Conkright, Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1974 |
Gallery
Van der Voort, Eivissa (SPAIN) |
1975 |
Gallery
Lanzenberg, Eivissa (SPAIN) |
1976 |
Museo
de Bellas Artes, Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1977 |
Gallery
Arte Contacto, Caracas (VENEZUELA)
Gallery International, Madrid. (SPAIN) |
1978 |
Gallery
Christine Colin, Paris (FRANCE)
Gallery Jesse, Bielefeld. (GERMANY) |
1979 |
Museo
Villa Vizcaya, Miami (USA)
Public Library of Dade, Miami (USA) |
1980 |
Gallery
Sutton, New York (USA)
Gallery CB2, Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1981 |
Fundación Miró, Barcelona (SPAIN)
Gallery Schoeller, Düsseldorf (GERMANY)
Gallery Sutton, New York (USA) |
1982 |
Studio
1, Musée d’Art Moderne Kunst Landreis, Cuxhaven. (FRANCE) |
1984 |
Gallery
Maloney, Eivissa (SPAIN) |
1986 |
Gallery
Blauer Ofen, Seeheim-Jugenheim (GERMANY) |
1987 |
Gallery
Dorothea van der Koelen, Mainz (FRANCE)
Gallery Franka Berndt, Paris (FRANCE) |
1990 |
Gallery
Lahumiére, Paris (FRANCE) |
|
|
Group Shows |
1956 |
Museo
de Bellas Artes, Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1964/65/66/67 |
Pintores Internacionales, Valencia (VENEZUELA) |
1965/78 |
Gallery
Byron, New York (USA)
Austin University Museum, Texas (USA) |
1966 |
Facultad de Arquitectura, Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1966/67 |
Exposition Irlandaise d’Art Vivant, Dublin (EIRE) |
1966/68 |
Movimiento y Color, Gallery Conkright, Caracas (VENEZUUELA) |
1967/70 |
Confrontación, Atenea de Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1968/70 |
Bienal
de Medellin (COLOMBIA) |
1968 |
Pintura
y Grabados de Venezuela y Colombia
Gallery Buchholz, Munich (GERMANY) |
1969 |
Newland
Galleries, Los Angeles, California (USA)
Gallery Denise René, Paris (FRANCE)
Biennale de Sao Paulo (BRAZIL) |
1970 |
International Exhibition, Osaka (JAPAN)
Color, Línea y Luz, Gallery Conkright, Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1971 |
Gallery
Buchholz, Bogotá (COLOMBIA)
Gold Medal in Biennale de Sao Paulo (BRAZIL) |
1972 |
Museo
de Bellas Artes, Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1973 |
Biennale of Sculptures, Budapest (HUNGARY) |
1975 |
Gallery
Schlégl, Zurich (SWITZERLAND)
White Gallery, Lausanne (SWITZERLAND) |
1978 |
Gallery
Van der Voort, Bale (SWITZERLAND) |
1979 |
Public
Library of Dade, Miami (USA)
Museo de Arte Contemporaneo, Caracas (VENEZUELA)
“Arte Construido” Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1980 |
Gallery
99, Bal Harbour, Miami (USA)
Gallery Sutton, New York (USA) |
1981 |
Equitable Gallery, New York (USA)
I.G. Metallgesellschaft AG, Fracfort (GERMANY) |
1986 |
Kronkret Sech, Nuremberg (GERMANY) |
1987 |
De 2
Carrés, Wilhem-Hack Museum, Ludwigshafen (GERMANY)
Institut Français, Minz (GERMANY) |
1988 |
Gallery
de Stis, Doedrecht, (HOLLAND) |
1989 |
En 3
Dimensions, Gallery Lahumiére, Paris (FRANCE) |
1989 |
Gallery
Dorothea Van der Koelen, Mainz, (GERMANY) |
1989/90 |
International Fairs in Frankfurt, Bale, Chicago, and the FIAC, with
the Gallery Lahumiére of Paris (FRANCE)
Museum of Klagenfurt (AUSTRIA) |
|
|
Awards |
1967 |
First
Prize Asociación del Museo de Bellas Artes, Caracas (VENEZUELA) |
1968 |
National Prize of Painting, Venezuela |
1969 |
National Prize of Sculpture, Venezuela |
1971 |
Golden
Medal in the Biennale of Sao Paulo (BRAZIL) |
|
|
Museum Acquisitions |
Canada |
Contemporanean Art Museum, Montreal |
Colombia
|
Museo
de Arte Moderno, Bogotá
Museo “La Tertulia”, Cali |
France |
Bibliothéque Nationale, Paris |
Italy |
Instituto Latino-Americano, Roma |
Mexico |
Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes, Mexico D.F |
Spain |
Museo
d’Art Contemporaní d’Eivissa
F. l’Autoroute Mediterranie, Barcelona |
USA
|
Modern
Art Museum New York
Institut Smithsonian, Washington DC
Museo del Arte Latino-Americano, Washington DC
Public Library of Dade, Miami
Public Library of Dade-South, Miami
Instituto de la Cultura, San Juan, Puerto Rico
Carnegie Library, San Juan, Puerto Rico |
Germany |
Modern
Art Museum Kunst Landreis, Cuxhaven
Bergen Museum, Glandbanch |
Venezuela
|
Galería
de Arte National, Caracas
Instituto “Los Teques”
Museo de Bellas Artes, Caracas
Museo de Arte Contemporaneo, Caracas
Museo de la Cultura, Maracaibo
Museo de Arte Moderno, Mérida
Museo de la Fundación Jesus Soto, Ciudad Bolivar |
Marcel Floris
Photograph © Klaus Sange
Acier
Peint, Autoroute Mediterranean, Gerona, Barcelona, 5 Metres x 7 Metres
1974
Angles Ambigus 74 x 44 x 17 1993
|
|
Fer Peint 80 x 38 x 17 cm
|
|
Giros, Painted Iron, 90 x 104 x 90
|
|
Colcar, Painted Iron, 148 x 190 x 99
|
|
Signature,
Unpainted Iron
75 x 50 x 50 cm 1996
|
|
Trois Points, Brass & Copper
67 x 57 x 40 cm 1996
|
|
Wilm, Painted Iron
60 x 53 x 30 cm 1995
|
|
|
|
Pliages Grillage De Fer Peint 40 x 50 x 42 cm
|
Aluminium Corporation
Venezuela
de Tourism,
Caracas, 1970
|
|
Marcel Floris
|
|
Foundation Joan Miro 1981
|
|
|
Murale 60 x 60 x 3 cm 1977
|
|
Aluminium, Biennale de Medellin,
Colombia, 1970
|
|
Murale 72 x 72 x 3 cm 1977
|
|
|
Installation Biennale de Sao Paulo, Brazil, 1971
All
Pictures Courtesy of Marcel Floris |
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