Jean Touret for the Marolles Workshop, Floor Lamp "Girouette"
About the Item
- Creator:Jean Touret (Designer)
- Dimensions:Height: 75.01 in (190.5 cm)Width: 16.51 in (41.91 cm)Depth: 22.01 in (55.88 cm)
- Style:Mid-Century Modern (Of the Period)
- Materials and Techniques:
- Place of Origin:
- Period:
- Date of Manufacture:circa 1950
- Condition:Wear consistent with age and use.
- Seller Location:Nice, FR
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU935724844282
Jean Touret
The stark brutalist furniture and decor created by French artist Jean Touret and his collective of artisans during the 20th century is ripe for a comeback, and it is today drawing the attention of galleries and collectors.
Touret was the founder of Les Artisans de Marolles, a collective of furniture makers based in the Loire Valley in the postwar era. The rustic but exquisitely proportioned pieces they produced included benches made from gouged wood, a wrought-iron sconce in the form of a cockerel, three-legged stools with seats carved to hug the body and a series of exceptional credenzas whose doors were sculpted by Touret himself, with themes like the seven deadly sins and pastoral life.
Touret’s talents were not deployed only on tables and lighting. From the mid-1960s until shortly before his death, in 2004, he earned his living largely through ecclesiastical commissions, the most famous of which was the altarpiece at Notre-Dame de Paris. Installed in 1989 and destroyed in the fire that swept through the cathedral in 2019, the work consisted of a brass chest clad with bronze panels depicting the evangelists and the four great prophets.
More than anything, Touret was a sculptor, although a rather unsuccessful one during his lifetime. He rarely exhibited, sold next to nothing and was never able to afford a heated studio.
Touret was born in 1916 and largely brought up in Le Mans, in western France. He worked in the legal department of a local insurance company before fighting in World War II, during which he spent five years as a prisoner of war on the German–Czechoslovakian border. There, he had his first real contact with wood while being forced to work as a lumberjack.
At the end of hostilities, he returned to France, settled in Marolles with his wife, Odile, and declared that he would become an artist (he had previously taken evening classes with a painter in Le Mans). In 1950, the manager of the Château de Chambord commissioned him to create a number of sculptures of deer and wild boars for the pavilions in the château’s park. That same year, Touret established Les Artisans de Marolles. For him, it was more a social venture than an artistic one. As industrialization expanded in postwar France, the village’s craftsmen found themselves in need of work.
The collective’s founding members were a basket maker, a potter, a blacksmith and a carpenter. The last, Émile Leroy, continued his work as a coffin maker while participating in the group. Touret acted as artistic director, imposing his aesthetic vision through direct discussions with the craftsmen in their workshops rather than through drawings. Over the years, the collective’s output was regularly exhibited in both the Marolles village hall and the more magnificent setting of the nearby Château Royal de Blois. Certain items were also stocked by the Primavera boutique in Paris, an offshoot of the department store Le Printemps.
To respond to the increasing demand, craftsmen from other villages were brought in, and as their numbers rose, so did tensions and disputes. Uninterested in ego management, Touret increasingly took a back seat, moving to a village on the other bank of the Loire in 1963 before officially quitting the following year. Although Les Artisans de Marolles continued to exist until 1970, the aesthetic quality of its production took a marked turn for the worse.
Touret then stopped creating secular furniture altogether. In 1965, he met a young chaplain at the Sorbonne, Jean-Marie Lustiger, who went on to become not only his most indefatigable supporter but also a cardinal and the archbishop of Paris. It was Lustiger who initiated most of Touret’s commissions for the Church, whether monumental sculptures of Christ, liturgical furniture or the Notre-Dame de Paris altarpiece.
Until recently, Touret’s furniture and decor had been forgotten for decades. Its rediscovery is largely due to dealers like Benoist F. Drut, at Maison Gerard in New York, and Yves and Victor Gastou, in Paris, who were attracted to its elemental forms and handcrafted spirit. An exhibition in 2022 at the Galerie Gastou posthumously shed light on the work.
Find vintage Jean Touret benches, floor lamps, tables and other furniture on 1stDibs.
- ShippingRetrieving quote...Ships From: Nice, France
- Return PolicyThis item cannot be returned.
- Marcel Ramond (1935) floor lamp, Phillips edition, Circa 1980, France.By Marcel RamondLocated in Nice, Cote d' AzurMarcel Ramond (1935), Metal floor lamp, prototype, Phillips edition, Circa 1980, France. Height: 190 cm, width: 60 cm depth: 18 cm.Category
Vintage 1980s French Mid-Century Modern Floor Lamps
MaterialsMetal
- Maison Arluce, floor lamp, iron and painted, circa 1960, France.Located in Nice, Cote d' AzurMaison Arluce, floor lamp, Néo-classical floor lamp in imitation of an oil lamp, brass and iron painted, circa 1960, France. Height 153 cm, diameter 54 cm.Category
Vintage 1960s French Modern Floor Lamps
MaterialsBrass, Iron
- Toni Cordero, Candleholders, Production Studio del Campo, Italy, circa 1980By Toni CorderoLocated in Nice, Cote d' AzurToni Cordero, candleholders, metal and enamelled copper, stone base. Production Studio Del Campo, circa 1980, Italy. Height: 77 cm, diameter: 10 cm.Category
Vintage 1980s Italian Mid-Century Modern Floor Lamps
MaterialsStone, Copper, Metal
- Jean Da Milano, Painting, France, circa 2000Located in Nice, Cote d' AzurJean Da Milano (1928-2017), painting, Creased paper, Signed lower right, circa 2000, France. Measures: Height 115 cm, Width 90 cm Jean Da Milano is an abstract painter from Nice who was cradled by the rich breeding ground of the School of Nice and its artists. Active from the 1960s to the 2008s, his works were forgotten and rediscovered by the HARTER Gallery, which today highlights his touch. According to Agnès Roux, Honorary Secretary for Culture, “Jean Da Milano is one of those modest painters who knew how to develop abstract painting alongside his contemporaries. In an infinite world, the Kinetic object on an astral background gradually transforms into a pictorial relief, where the painting falsely becomes painting and invisibly paper. The humility of its formats does not give the work the fullness it deserves. But the almighty gaze of the spectator engenders the feelings and sensations of a cosmogonic painting steeped in universality ". We indeed observe in his work an evolution which begins with an almost cosmic painting in the 70s, then what we could qualify as “implosions” in the 80s and finally, a real research on paper and pictorial relief. in the 2000s. According to Georges Braque "Everyone is a creator, the viewer is himself a creator, it is the way of seeing that gives life to the object. " Personal exhibitions: - 1992: Golden Gallery Nice - 1988: Acropolis Nice - 1982: Municipal Gallery Renoir Nice - 1977: Municipal Museum Saint-Paul-de-Vence Collective exhibitions: - 1992: Golden Gallery - 1991: Golden Gallery - 1990: Golden Gallery - Art Jonction - 1989: Nice university center - 1987: Acropolis - 1985: Chapel of Mercy Vallauris - 1984: CIAC Paris and Chapelle des Pénitents in Péone - 1983: Art Expo Dallas Texas and Art Expo New York - 1980: Galerie Waterlot Nice - 1971: Necrolium Nice - 1970: Maison de la Culture Magnan Nice and Musée de la Salle Marine Nice - 1969: Galerie Le Nombre d´Or Nice - 1968: Musée de la Salle Marine Nice and Galerie Salmon Nice - 1966: Paul Langevin Biot school group - 1965: Chapelle St Esprit...Category
Early 2000s French Mid-Century Modern Paintings
MaterialsPaper
- Jean Da Milano, Painting, France, circa 2000Located in Nice, Cote d' AzurJean Da Milano (1928-2017), Painting, Creased Kraft paper and collage, mixed media, Signed lower right, circa 2000, France. Measures : Height 100...Category
Early 2000s French Mid-Century Modern Paintings
MaterialsPaint, Paper
- Jean Da Milano, Composition, Oil on Canvas, 1977, FranceLocated in Nice, Cote d' AzurJean Da Milano (1928-2017), Abstract composition, Oil on canvas, representing a red sphere, Signed and dated lower left, N°1401-77, n°11 1977, France. Measures : Height 92 cm - Wi...Category
Vintage 1970s French Mid-Century Modern Paintings
MaterialsPaint
- Jean Touret Atelier Marolles, Floor Lamp "Girouette"Located in grand Lancy, CHJean Touret Atelier Marolles - floor lamp "Girouette" from the 50s.Category
Vintage 1950s Floor Lamps
MaterialsWrought Iron
- Pair Jean Touret Ateliers Marolles France Iron Floor Lamps Girouette Hand ForgedBy Jean TouretLocated in Bridgehampton, NYPair of handcrafted pair of cast and wrought iron by Ateliers de Marolles under the direction of Jean Touret. The studio in South France designed and crafted lighting and furniture during the 1950s. This pair has a rooster weather vane motifs and the cardinal points...Category
Mid-20th Century French Mid-Century Modern Floor Lamps
MaterialsWrought Iron
- Rooster Floor Lamp in Wrought Iron by Jean Touret for Ateliers Marolles, 1950'sBy Atelier Marolles, Jean TouretLocated in VÉZELAY, FRBeautiful quadripod floor lamp depicting a rooster, in wrought and hammered iron. Mid-Century Modern, France, circa 1950-1960. By Jean Touret (1916-2004), French sculptor and d...Category
Vintage 1950s French Mid-Century Modern Floor Lamps
MaterialsWrought Iron
- Coq Wrought-Iron Floor Lamp, attributed to Jean Touret, Ateliers MAROLLES, 1950By Jean TouretLocated in NICE, FRWrought-iron floor lamp attributed to Jean Touret for Atelier Marolles, France, circa 1955. Rare large (140 cm) wrought-iron floor lamp with painted finish. Good condition. Sold without shade. Known to insiders, particularly for his work in sacred art, the work of this artist and craftsman is enjoying a resurgence of interest, correlated with that of craftsmanship. Jean Touret is the subject of a book published by Editions de l'Amateur, which is also making a comeback. Today, there's a real interest. Many galleries abroad and in France are interested in his work and promoting it. This is also one of the reasons behind this book. It responds to a current craze for all things artisanal and a return to a certain revivalism. His work is being showcased in some galleries, but also in auction rooms, and there's a real quest for it. These are pieces that are starting to command substantial prices. Jean Touret by Anne Bonny...Category
Vintage 1950s French Rustic Floor Lamps
MaterialsWrought Iron
- Pair of 1950s-1960s Wrought Iron Chandeliers by Jean Touret, Marolles Workshop.By Jean TouretLocated in Saint-Ouen, FRPair of 1950s-1960s wrought iron chandeliers by Jean Touret, Marolles workshop. Pair of wrought iron chandeliers by Jean Touret, Marolles workshop, 6 lights each, circa 1950-1960. h...Category
20th Century French Mid-Century Modern Chandeliers and Pendants
MaterialsWrought Iron
- Ateliers Marolles by Jean Touret Table Lamp Wrought IronBy Jean Touret, Atelier MarollesLocated in Chicago, ILFrench Midcentury table lamp by Ateliers de Marolles. Created by Jean Touret, artistic director and Henri VION, ironworker, France, ca.1950. Tripod table lamp with rooster singing pa...Category
Vintage 1950s French Mid-Century Modern Table Lamps
MaterialsWrought Iron