Fernand Léger

Exuding the influence of the Neo-classicist painter Jacques-Louis David, Léger created Les loisirs sur fond rouge in 1949 following his grand homage to the painter he so admired,  Les loisirs, Hommage à Louis David; in fact, the paintings are quite similar with variations only in details and color schemes. According to Léger, “I wanted to proclaim a return to simplicity by way of an immediate art without any subtlety, comprehensible to all. I love David because he is so anti-Impressionist…I love the dryness in his work and also that of Ingres. That was my way and it touched me instantly” (Dora Vallier, Kunst und Zeugnis, Zurich, 1961, p. 62). The direct gaze of the subjects, the grand scale, even the posture of the reclining woman in the foreground all seem borrowed directly from David.

Leger’s interest in architectural works stems from his involvement in the 1937 mural Les transport des forces at the Palais de la Découverte for the Exposition Internationale in Paris as well as a mural for the 1939 New York Word’s fair (since destroyed). However, it was his introduction to Roland Brice which opened his eyes to ceramics and eventually mosaics. Léger was able to further realize his interest in architectural adornment when he was commissioned to create a mosaic for the façade of the church of L’Église Notre-Dame-de-toute Grâce at Assy in 1946, followed by the 1950 mosaic commemorating those soldiers who fought in the Battle of the Bulge in Bastogne, Belgium. Other commissions for mosaics as well as stained-glass windows were in production at the time of Léger’s sudden death in 1955. In fact, the design of the façade of the Musée Leger, composed of sculptural and mosaic elements, as seen in figure 2, was intended for the Olympic Stadium in Hanover.

According to Nicholas Serota, “It is a paradox that for all his ambition to create an art that would address a broad public, Léger had remarkably few opportunities to work in this area, other than in temporary manifestations like the great exhibitions, or as in the final decade of his life, in his mosaics and stained-glass projects for the church” (Fernand Léger: The Later Years (exhibition catalogue), Whitechapel Art Gallery, London, 1987, p. 10).

The painting Les loisirs sur fond rouge was created as a unique mosaic under the direction of Georges Bauquier, the director of the musée Léger,  and is based on the 1949 painting of the same title (fig 1).

Fig. 1 Fernand Léger, Les loisirs sur fond rouge, 1949, oil on canvas, Musée national Fernand Léger, Biot

Fig. 2 Façade of the Musée national Fernand Léger, Biot