Pascal Monteil
Quand la broderie se fait peinture
Portrait (C) Raphaël Creton
Photographer, painter, globetrotter, poet, embroiderer, Pascal Monteil takes us on a journey.
After studying at the Beaux-Arts (Villa Arson in Nice), Pascal Monteil, originally from Uzès, moved to Paris where he taught at the Beaux-Arts preparatory school.
But he quickly feels cramped in this city and his curiosity, his thirst for discovery, will push him to leave. He becomes nomad. For 35 years, he traveled the roads of Asia.
Depending on the countries in which he lived, he imagined himself as a ceramist, a weaver, an icon painter in Russia, a boatman... From Kyoto to Japan, Calcutta in India, Istanbul in Turkey, Tabriz in Iran, his thirst for discovery is inexhaustible.
It is nourished by these landscapes, the various atmospheres, colors, different lights, literature, history, scenes of life, encounters.
Fascinated by Iran, he discovered during his wanderings, a Persian patio, in which men were mending carpets. The image will remain engraved in his memory.
Back in France, he ended up settling down in Arles, the stronghold of his great friend Christian Lacroix.
He sets up his workshop on the roof terrace of his house where he recreates the Persian patio of his memory. It will be his haven of peace, his place of work.
In the distance, the Alpilles mountain range, Mont Ventoux, Montmajour abbey, the towers of the city's arenas carry away, if necessary, his imagination.
Child of the land, son of winegrowers, he knows this scrubland well, where apparently, but only in appearance, nothing moves.
Pascal lives and breathes through these landscapes crushed by heat where the sun at its zenith closes the shutters of the houses. But life is there, hidden from view, silent and yet active.
At the start of his work, Pascal Monteil does not sketch anything, he does not draw anything, he writes. Throughout the pages, his traveling soul gives birth to his characters.
Everything is in place in his head, he can now sit on his terrace.
In a semi-reclined position, on an ottoman chair, time can pass.
Armed with a mattress needle, Pascal does not embroider, he paints.
On his knees an antique hemp canvas, at his feet balls of wool from Camargue merino sheep or Colbert wool, Pascal can embroider like this for ten hours.
“The needle, free and incisive, is like a paintbrush
The thread, like a tube of pure color "
Like this scrubland where life seems to flow slowly, Pascal takes his time.
The movement is slow. This slowness, discovered in Asia, has become his essential, it is his breath, his breathing.
The embroidery stitch, although archaic, is full of history, traditions and travel.
The rich range of colors takes us from Asia to Spain and Italy. Black further highlights this richness.
Pascal Monteil's tapestries, often imbued with underlying tragedy, tell us a story. The characters meet, collide with their moods, their customs, their appearances. Both imbued with history, mythology, literature, biblical references or simply fictional, they speak to us, question us, shake us up, but do not leave us indifferent.
You will be able to admire "The Dead Queen" (tapestry) at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Lyon from March to September 2024 as part of the exhibition dedicated to the collection of Antoine de Galbert
While an exhibition is planned for 2025 (June) at the Museum of Art and History of Judaism in Paris bringing together all of Pascal's large formats over the past 10 years. Do not miss it !
With the kind collaboration of Pascal Monteil
La Monja Gitana
Photographie (C) Célia Pernot Courtesy Galerie Regala, Arles.
"In Llanto por la Monja Gitana, I spoke about this need to work while moving. But Rimbaud's stretcher, Summer tapestry, Noé or Mouche mort, all these tapestries are linked to exile. There is in the "act of weaving a real violence. With a needle, we pierce a skin into which we introduce threads from living organisms. People who make tapestry tell you about the cry of fabrics, the cry of silk, the scream of hemp , etc. The tapestry is the necessary medium to express exile since the fact of exiling individuals is a violence of the same order. Exile is an absence of choice, there are no more possible permutations."
"the needle that weaves is also the one that repairs. My paintings create a city of refuge for those who understand nothing of reality."
Pascal Monteil
(Interview with Richas Raya)
"Dernier printemps sur terre"- Collection Musée des Arts Décoratifs Photographie (c) Célia Pernot Courtesy Galerie Regala, Arles
"I met Pascal Monteil almost twenty years ago. I saw him follow his initiatory path. He then embedded images within images, characters that were a bit contortionist or naturist, telling their hermetic stories in places with subtly falsified perspectives. Already a story of sewing and stitching, of expressive sutures. Then he moved on to miniatures and frescoes, sorts of monumentally refined illuminations, clever mazes of architecture and characters defined in the most precise terms. Already a story embroidery."
Christian Lacroix
Pour aller plus loin:
Portrait au Madlab du domaine Tarbouriech, Marseillan.(c) Raphael Creton
