A very interesting structure designed by three Spanish architects Rafael Aranda, Carme Pigem and Ramon Vilalta of the RCR agency, the museum houses Pierre and Colette Soulages's donations to the city of Rodez, the artist's birthplace, here in the south west of France.
 |
| The low level building is clad with rust coloured panels |
Over 500 works and documents are on display, including studies for the artist's stained glass windows in Conques, paintings from his youth, works in walnut ink and the complete catalogue of his prints.
Starting in 1979, Soulages began working almost exclusively in black or, as he calls it, "outrenoir"("beyond black"), exploring the way light reflects off of black surfaces. The museum's first exhibit, from May 30 to October 5, 2014, focuses on these "Outrenoir" works.
 |
| Outrenoir oil on canvas showing textures |
The artist is currently the highest-valued living French artist on the contemporary art circuit. In 2009, a retrospective of his work at the Centre Pompidou in Paris attracted over 500,000 visitors.
A really interesting building and mixed reactions from our group of six about the art but overall we decided it interesting, powerful and black.
We had lunch at the kiosk, 14.50 euros each, very nice, lovely setting overlooking the bandstand. In the bandstand they were having a display of books which had been donated and were being made in to art forms and then they were going to be given away. You know me and books, I spent time browsing.
Rodez city itself is worth a visit and we were sorry we did not have time to fit in the museum.
We now want to go to Conques to see the windows in the Cathedral which were designed by Pierre Soulages.
 |
| 104 windows in specially made glass at Conques |
comments to taglines82@gmail.com
