CHARLEY TOOROP
(1891–1955)
19 February – 9 May 2010
11 Avenue du Président Wilson
75116 Paris
France
Tel. 01 53 67 40 00
Bart van der Leck, Fernand Léger, Piet Mondrian, Gerrit Rietveld, Ossip Zadkine, Jan Toorop, Edgar Fernhout, John Raedecker, Pyke Koch, Henk Chabot, Joris Ivens, John Fernhout, Eva Besnyö
The Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris is presenting the first Paris retrospective of pioneer Dutch modernist Charley Toorop. This adaptation of the 2008 exhibition “Surtout pas de principes!”, organised by Marja Bosma at the Boymans Van Beuningen Museum in Rotterdam, also includes a “guest room” in which contributions by other artists from her family and circle of friends set her in context at the crossroads of Modernism.
The exhibition will comprise some 110 works: 77 by Toorop herself and others by friends and relatives including Bart van der Leck, Fernand Léger, Piet Mondrian, Gerrit Rietveld, Ossip Zadkine, Jan Toorop, Edgar Fernhout, John Raedecker, Pyke Koch, Henk Chabot, Joris Ivens, John Fernhout and Eva Besnyö.
After moving from her initial Luminist vein to a dark-toned Expressionism, Toorop reached maturity around 1927 as a practitioner of the New Objectivity, which she would continue to explore in her own deeply distinctive way until her death in 1955.
Fundamentally a realist marked in her youth by Symbolism and the early Van Gogh, she never lost her resultant commitment to the “inspired gaze” in her painterly transposition of reality. In her portraits of groups, artist friends and Zeeland farmers, as well as her striking series of self-portraits and the commissions forced upon her by the Depression, the human figure remains a presence of incredible plastic power.
Characterised by the social consciousness and values that led her to reject the system imposed during the German occupation of Holland, Toorop’s brand of realism was as much at odds with the times as it was an integral part of modernity.
Director
Fabrice Hergott
Curator
Gérard Audinet
Practical information
Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris
11 Avenue du Président Wilson
75116 Paris
Tel. 01 53 67 40 00
Open Tuesday–Sunday, 10am–6pm
Late opening Thursdays until 10pm
Press Officer
Maud Ohana
Tel. 01 53 67 40 51
Email: maud.ohana@paris.fr
Also at the museum…
Sturtevant
The Razzle-dazzle of Thinking
5 February – 25 April 2010
Jan Dibbets
Horizons
19 February – 2 May 2010