French Connections exhibition a tour de force

If it is a collection of art par excellence that you are after, look no further than French Connections, an exhibition from the collection of the Johannesburg Art Gallery (JAG).

This exhibition of works from JAG’s French collection, is the result of negotiations between JAG and l’Institut Français d’Afrique du Sud as part of the France-South Africa Seasons 2012 and 2013.

The exhibition is a pièce de résistance. It consists of historically significant work from the crème de la crème of French artists, from Claude Monet to Paul Cézanne and Henri Matisse. It aims to investigate a very specific time and place in a developmental era in European history, and looks at the precursors of Impressionism, Impressionism, Post-Impressionism and other alternate methods of visual expression from 1830 to the 20th century.

Included are 19th Century French painter Claude Monet and Alfred Sisley as well as Auguste Rodin; Romantics, such as Eugene Delacroix, Eugène Boudin and the Barbizon School (Charles-Francois Daubigny, Narcisse Virgilio Diaz de la Pena, Camille Corot, Henri-Joseph Harpignies, Jean-Francois Millet); Realism artists such as Edouard Manet, Gustave Courbet and Honoré Daumier; and Impressionists included in this exhibition include Edgar Hilaire Degas, Jean-Baptiste Armand Guillaumin, Berthe Morisot, Camille Pissaro and Pierre-Auguste Renoir. The list of Post-Impressionists contained in the collection include Paul Gauguin, Paul Cézanne, Henri Matisse and Andre Derain.

Also included are several very important artists with French connections: Francis Bacon for example, is an Irish-born British figurative painter who spent time in Paris and was deeply influenced by French artist Nicolas Poussin and Picasso’s 1927 exhibition at the Galerie Paul Rosenberg (Paris). JAG owns an exquisite collection of artworks by the Post–Impressionist artist Toulouse-Lautrec and these will be displayed in one of the smaller separate galleries. Picasso was Spanish-born but his career also unfolded in Paris. The controversial Harlequin will be on display alongside 13 other pieces by the artist.

Gerard Sekoto, who left South Africa to live in Paris under self-imposed exile, worked in France from 1947. He is recognised as the pioneer of urban black art and social realism. An area of the exhibition space is dedicated to this influential South African Modernist.

The exhibition opens on 28 October 2012 and will run until 10 March 2013. Entrance is free.

The gallery is located on King George Street, between Wolmarans and Noord street in the Joubert Park, Johannesburg.

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