Raoul Dufy’s textile works on loan to the Centre Pompidou and recently exhibited in Shanghai at the Raoul Dufy: The Melody of Happiness exhibition are back in our collections!
At the beginning of the 20th century, the young Raoul Dufy (1877-1953) was still struggling to make a living from his painting. He was particularly interested in the pedagogy and productions of the atelier “Martine”.
Together with Paul Poiret, he soon set up a printing workshop, La Petite Usine, in premises on Boulevard de Clichy.
The previous year, Dufy had produced woodcuts for Guillaume Apollinaire’s Le Bestiaire, whose primitivist, expressionist style had enthralled the couturier.
At Poiret’s suggestion, Dufy transposed the plates from his Bestiaire into motifs for printing on fabric. At his patron’s expense, he apprenticed as a textile designer.
In 1912, Lyon silk manufacturer Bianchini Férier offered Dufy a new collaboration, this time on an industrial scale. The firm offered him a golden bridge, guaranteeing him a minimum annual interest of seven thousand francs. Although no longer associated, Poiret and Dufy continued to work together from time to time.
In 2002, Cédric Brochier, grandson of Joseph Brochier, bought the Bianchini Férier silk house, whose archives include over 2,000 original textile drawings by Raoul Dufy.
