Marie Cuttoli (née Myriam Bordes; 1879 – 1973) was a
French entrepreneur
Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values th ...
, born in Tulle, and patron of
modernist
Modernism is both a philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new forms of art, philosophy, an ...
tapestry
Tapestry is a form of textile art, traditionally woven by hand on a loom. Tapestry is weft-faced weaving, in which all the warp threads are hidden in the completed work, unlike most woven textiles, where both the warp and the weft threads may ...
.
Career
Cuttoli's original interests were in reviving carpet production in
Algeria
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. Around 1910, she set up a workshop in her Algerian home to teach the trade to local women; their works were then sold to
haute couture
''Haute couture'' (; ; French for 'high sewing', 'high dressmaking') is the creation of exclusive custom-fitted high-end fashion design that is constructed by hand from start-to-finish. Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, Paris became th ...
houses in Paris.
In 1925, her works were displayed and well received at the
.
In the same year, she opened Maison Myrbor (an abbreviation of her maiden name), a gallery and design house in Paris on Rue Vignon designed by
Jean Lurçat
Jean Lurçat (; 1 July 1892 – 6 January 1966) was a French artist noted for his role in the revival of contemporary tapestry.
Biography
He was born in Bruyères, Vosges, the son of Lucien Jean Baptiste Lurçat and Marie Emilie Marguerite L ...
. The street included established art dealers, such as
Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler.
Maison Myrbor produced embroidered and appliqué dresses, some designed by
Natalia Goncharova
Natalia Sergeevna Goncharova (russian: Ната́лья Серге́евна Гончаро́ва, p=nɐˈtalʲjə sʲɪrˈɡʲe(j)ɪvnə ɡənʲtɕɪˈrovə; 3 July 188117 October 1962) was a Russian avant-garde artist, painter, costume designe ...
, offered a decoration department, and held major painting exhibitions for artists such as
Salvador Dalí
Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (; ; ; 11 May 190423 January 1989) was a Spanish Surrealism, surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, and the striking and bizarr ...
and
Francis Cyril Rose
Francis Cyril Rose (1909–1979), also Sir Francis, 4th Baronet of the Montreal Roses, was an English painter vigorously championed by Gertrude Stein. His wife Frederica, Lady Rose (1910–2002) became a well known travel writer, notably on Cor ...
.
The
Barnes Foundation
The Barnes Foundation is an art collection and educational institution promoting the appreciation of art and horticulture. Originally in Merion, the art collection moved in 2012 to a new building on Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia, Pen ...
exhibited her work in 2020, and published a catalog of this work, citing the exhibition as the first celebration of "her visionary approach to art and business" by a major American institution.
Cuttoli commissioned
tapestry cartoons from
Georges Braque
Georges Braque ( , ; 13 May 1882 – 31 August 1963) was a major 20th-century List of French artists, French painter, Collage, collagist, Drawing, draughtsman, printmaker and sculpture, sculptor. His most notable contributions were in his all ...
,
Fernand Léger
Joseph Fernand Henri Léger (; February 4, 1881 – August 17, 1955) was a French painting, painter, sculpture, sculptor, and film director, filmmaker. In his early works he created a personal form of cubism (known as "tubism") which he gradually ...
,
Joan Miró
Joan Miró i Ferrà ( , , ; 20 April 1893 – 25 December 1983) was a Catalan painter, sculptor and ceramicist born in Barcelona. A museum dedicated to his work, the Fundació Joan Miró, was established in his native city of Barcelona i ...
, and
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...
in 1927.
The following year, she turned her attention to reviving the
Aubusson tapestry
Aubusson tapestry is tapestry manufactured at Aubusson, in the upper valley of the Creuse in central France. The term often covers the similar products made in the nearby town of Felletin, whose products are often treated as "Aubusson". The i ...
industry.
She encouraged additional
avant-garde
The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...
artists of the time to weave tapestries based upon their easel paintings.
These included
Raoul Dufy
Raoul Dufy (; 3 June 1877 – 23 March 1953) was a French Fauvism, Fauvist painter. He developed a colorful, decorative style that became fashionable for designs of ceramic art, ceramics and textile as well as decorative schemes for public bu ...
,
Le Corbusier
Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (6 October 188727 August 1965), known as Le Corbusier ( , , ), was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture. He was ...
, Lurçat,
Henri Matisse
Henri Émile Benoît Matisse (; 31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French visual artist, known for both his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known prima ...
, and
Rouault.
Cuttoli went on to partner with
Galerie Jeanne Bucher, and later with
Galerie Lucie Weill & Seligmann.
Personal life
In 1912,
she married
Paul Cuttoli, an
Algerian
Algerian may refer to:
* Something of, or related to Algeria
* Algerian people
This article is about the demographic features of the population of Algeria, including population density, ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, econo ...
-born French politician, a
Radical Socialist senator
A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...
.
The Cuttolis built a mansion in
Philippeville
Philippeville (; wa, Flipveye) is a city and municipality of Wallonia located in the province of Namur, Belgium. The Philippeville municipality includes the former municipalities of Fagnolle, Franchimont, Jamagne, Jamiolle, Merlemont, Ne ...
, Algeria named Villa Myriam.
Her
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
ian home at 55 Rue de Babylone went on to become the home of
Yves Saint Laurent and his partner,
Pierre Bergé
Pierre Vital Georges Bergé (; 14 November 1930 – 8 September 2017) was a French industrialist and patron. He co-founded the fashion label Yves Saint Laurent, and was a longtime business partner (and onetime life partner) of its namesake des ...
.
A close friend of Picasso and other contemporary artists, the Cuttolis collected works by Picasso, as well Braque, Dufy, and Léger.
Her collection of
Cubist
Cubism is an early-20th-century avant-garde art movement that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture. In Cubist artwork, objects are analyzed, broken up and reassemble ...
works was donated to the
Musée National d'Art Moderne
The Musée National d'Art Moderne (; "National Museum of Modern Art") is the national museum for modern art of France. It is located in Paris and is housed in the Centre Pompidou in the 4th arrondissement of the city. In 2021 it ranked 10th in ...
,
the 1969 Cuttoli-Laugier donation to the same museum included a collection of Picassos.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cuttoli, Marie
1879 births
1973 deaths
Pieds-Noirs
French art patrons