Inspirantes Inspiratrices

The image of the muse or female source of inspiration is an inescapable component in the adventure of artistic creation. It constitutes the compost from which the artist’s passion – be it fatal, consuming, or joyfully radiant – develops.
Muses were women who understood, supported, looked ahead, and who were there through the vicissitudes that artists must inevitably endure. Some were their wives or their mistresses, others simply their models, but all of them, because of what they emanated, what they thought or what they were, marked their presence with a special grace in the artistic creations that arose before their eyes.
The muse, the female inspiration, allows the artist to go beyond himself, probing the limits of creation in search of the secret bonds established in this hyper-intimacy, possessing the power to give these works their unique character.
The common thread that connects the works in this exhibition, bringing together roughly twenty artists between 1870 and 1960, is provided by Marthe, Misia, Lola, Dina, Lydia, Lucy, Jacqueline and many others. All the works are illustrated and accompanied by rich descriptive explanations.
Essays by Gilles Genty, Jean-Louis Schefer and Véronique Serrano provide original insights on the subject in general.

Le Cannet, Musée Bonnard, July - November 2018