Nicolas de Staël's flashes of brilliance at Paris's Musée d'Art Moderne

A tour led by our talented guide Sandra Benoist.
Tuesday, October 3 12:45 p.m.

" I can only go from accident to accident. From his first steps in figurative painting to the explosive years of abstraction, Nicolas de Staël's career had the fulgurating effect of a meteor whose mad course ended, alas, prematurely in Antibes, where the painter, consumed by heartbreak, finally committed the irreparable at the age of 41. Less than seventy years after his tragic demise, the Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris sets out in pursuit of the Prince foudroyé, with a masterly exhibition highlighting the feverish spirit of a relentless worker.

Through a selection of 200 paintings, drawings, engravings and notebooks, this major retrospective paints a portrait of a painter on the razor's edge, who destroyed as many works as he produced in the course of his life. Caught by the demon of painting, Nicolas de Staël created in a hurry, attacking several canvases in parallel, working on them by successive superimpositions and alterations... before throwing them away. His shades of grey, tight brushstrokes and strong impastos all bear witness to the experimental nature of his work.

A whirlwind career spanning no more than 15 years, which the museum follows step by step from Saint Petersburg to Paris, to his final resting place, a small studio by the sea.

Excerpt from : Arts in the City
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TRANSPORT
Metro: line 9 - Alma-Marceau or Iéna stop;

Bus: Iéna: lines 32, 63 and 82 (Iéna), Alma-Marceau: lines 42, 80 and 92, Musée d'Art moderne: line 72 ;
Vélib' stations: 4 rue de Longchamp; 4 avenue Marceau; place de la reine Astrid or 45 avenue Marceau ;

Bicycles: Bicycle parking spaces available in front of the museum entrance.