Jean-Michel Meurice (1938–2022) was a major French visual artist and filmmaker, a key figure in abstraction and the Supports/Surfaces movement. Through painting, video, and television, he redefined our relationship with art, color, and perception.
Born in Lille on December 6, 1938, Jean-Michel Meurice studied in 1957 at the École des Beaux-Arts in Tournai, in an atmosphere of openness and experimentation. During his military service in Algeria, he continued to paint, later stating that this period was essential to his artistic development.
His encounter with Pierre Soulages in the 1960s played a decisive role, encouraging him to fully pursue a creative path.
A Career between Painting and Cinema
From 1963, Meurice exhibited in France and internationally. He joined the Jean Fournier gallery in Paris in 1966, while simultaneously embarking on a parallel career as a filmmaker. He then created portraits of major artists such as Bram Van Velde, Sonia Delaunay, and Alberto Burri.
He actively engaged in the Supports/Surfaces movement, co-founded with other artists, which challenged classical formats and favored experimentation with the materiality of the artwork.
His painting was thereafter characterized by the use of horizontal bands, inspired by bayadère fabrics, painted directly onto the canvas laid on the floor. He also explored aluminum film, vinyls, and perforated canvases, always in pursuit of chromatic vibration.
Style and Pictorial Approach
Jean-Michel Meurice played with repetition, bold colors, light, and transparencies. He developed an all-over painting style, which did not seek depth but rather the surface as a vibrant field.
He gradually introduced stylized plant motifs, echoing decorative art and nature. His works are situated in a tension between radical modernity and decorative tradition.
He also created works integrated into architecture: a ceiling at the Picasso Museum (Antibes), the floor of Roissy CDG airport, among others.
His works are featured in major collections: Centre Pompidou, Picasso Museum, Maeght Foundation, Fabre Museum, Reina Sofía Museum in Madrid, Tokyo International Forum…
In 2013, he received the Grand Prix de Peinture from the Académie des Beaux-Arts for his entire body of work. The Fabre Museum dedicated a retrospective to him in 2018, recognizing his unique contribution to contemporary art.
In parallel, Jean-Michel Meurice created numerous art documentaries for television, praised for their aesthetic rigor. He received the Grand Prix National de la Création Audiovisuelle in 1992.
He was also one of the founders of the Franco-German channel Arte, which he directed from 1986 to 1989. His commitment to culture thus extended beyond the studio.
“La Rotonde” at Château D’Arsac: Chromatic Immersion
In the cellars of Château d’Arsac, Jean-Michel Meurice’s La Rotonde offers an immersive experience. This circular work, installed in the heart of the wine estate, showcases his luminous painting in direct dialogue with the architectural space.
Colored bands, chromatic rhythms, transparencies: everything evokes the pulsation of life, light, and wine in the making. The work transforms a place of production into a place of contemplation.
It perfectly embodies Meurice’s approach: making surfaces vibrate, blending painting, environment, and sensation.
Jean-Michel Meurice leaves behind a rich legacy. At the crossroads of painting, film, and cultural transmission, he explored color as energy, rhythm, and language. La Rotonde, at Château d’Arsac, continues to radiate this sensitive and universal ambition.
To discover, along with other artists, on our Art & Vines page
https://chateau-arsac.com/art-contemporain-vigne-alliance-chateau-arsac/
