Lustre Atelier Marolles

Lustre with a battered iron rooster, by jean touret for atelier marolles, circa 1950. Wrought iron, brown patina, 6 lights that works with the original electrical installation. A young student with a degree in fine arts in paris, jean touret was taken prisoner during the second world war. He was sent to southern germany, to the wooded mountains of herzgebirge, where he worked as a lumberjack. There he discovered the rustic life of the peasants, nature and woodworking. On his return to france, animated by a new philosophy of life, he left paris and followed his friend, the painter maurice rocher, to settle in marolles, a tiny village near blois. He befriended the village carpenter, emile leroy, and met three other craftsmen (a ironworker, henri vion, a basket maker, edmond le flohic, and a potter, manuel gold) with whom he created a craft cooperative. Jean touret's founding utopia, motivated by the rejection of the generalizing taste in the 1950s for standardized furniture, manufactured in industrial materials, obedrrant with traditional know-how, is to create an association of production of furniture and decorative objects by combining know-how. His ambition to develop a simple, noble and contemporary aesthetic, while preserving the archetypal forms of rustic furniture, was born. Success will follow. In 1964, he decided to devote himself entirely to painting and left the artistic direction of the group of "artisans of marolles and loir and cher".