Literature
"Jean-Jacques Gailliard" Alfonso Enriquez de Villegas Diaz, Ed. Marot, 2014, p. 153 ill."Jean-Jacques Gailliard. Les jeux de l'abstrait 1920-1930" Xavier Canonne, Antwerp 2017, ill.
PAINTING IS A PLAY
As the son of the Impressionist painter Franz Gailliard, Jean-Jacques was surrounded from childhood by artists, musicians, philosophers and mystics. He felt closely connected with the spiritual, which is also reflected in the experiments with abstraction he undertook in the 1920s.
Painting is a game for Gailliard. A game of hands and mind, in which the inner and the outer merge. For him painting was the synthesis of the material and the spiritual. Stained brush strokes and warm earthy tones emphasize the materiality of the painting. His adventure in abstraction does not lead to cool geometry, like that of his colleagues. Gaillard's geometry is dreamy, loose and imaginative. A surreal abstraction connecting nature and imagination.
"Les jeux sont faits!" as the French say in gambling. This painting is an absurd composition of colorful dice. Their arrangement looks like a spinning wheel, a roulette. Shadows make the squares hover and reveal a constantly changing perspective that causes dynamic propulsion. Shapes and colors spin before our eyes. Even the three-part signature turns around. The outcome of this surreal game remains uncertain.
As the son of the Impressionist painter Franz Gailliard, Jean-Jacques was surrounded from childhood by artists, musicians, philosophers and mystics. He felt closely connected with the spiritual, which is also reflected in the experiments with abstraction he undertook in the 1920s.
Painting is a game for Gailliard. A game of hands and mind, in which the inner and the outer merge. For him painting was the synthesis of the material and the spiritual. Stained brush strokes and warm earthy tones emphasize the materiality of the painting. His adventure in abstraction does not lead to cool geometry, like that of his colleagues. Gaillard's geometry is dreamy, loose and imaginative. A surreal abstraction connecting nature and imagination.
"Les jeux sont faits!" as the French say in gambling. This painting is an absurd composition of colorful dice. Their arrangement looks like a spinning wheel, a roulette. Shadows make the squares hover and reveal a constantly changing perspective that causes dynamic propulsion. Shapes and colors spin before our eyes. Even the three-part signature turns around. The outcome of this surreal game remains uncertain.
