Œdipe, following...13th Issue

 

Thanks : You are more than 70, by average, to read the French version of this blog every day, which represents 180 pages read daily. Thanks also to all those who share their readings with others, and keep alive the work of Alfred Courmes.

 

 

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You will find in this issue other versions of Oedipus and the Sphinx, preparatory drawings, studies to enrich the preceding issue and follow the story of Oedipus and his daughter Antigone.          

 

 

 

"Pourquoi…? toujours faire la brouette! Non. Non. Essayez l'escarpolette", 1978, oil on canvas (92 x 73 cm)

private ownership ©adagp

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Œdipe et le Sphinx", 1944, lead pencil

private ownership. © adagp                                                                  

   "Œdipe et le Sphinx", 1945, oil on canvas (92 x 73 cm)

private ownership. © adagp

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Étude pour " Le Sphinx acétylène", lead pencil (27 x 18 cm)

private ownership © adagp

"Œdipe et le Sphinx acétylène", 1944, oil on canevas (92 x 73 cm)

private ownership. © adagp

 

 

“Thinking about it, Oedipus is a very queer guy who found the answer to the Sphinx enigma, and back to Athens, went to bed with his mother, which is not the right way to orientate one’s life. He complained about it. I made another canvas in which he regrets to have wrongly spent his youth time”                   

 

 

"Œdipe aveugle et sa fille Antigone. J'ai mal occu....j'ai mal occupé ma jeunesse",1962, oil on canvas

(112 x 146 cm) private ownership. © adagp

 

 

 "Antigone et son papa", 1973, oil on canvas (100 x 81 cm), private ownership. © adagp

 

 

 

 

"Autoportrait du peintre dans son atelier à Colone", 1958, oil on canvas (130 x 195 cm), private ownership.  © adagp

This painting has been amended later on with a complementary mention to the title on it:

“This girl, thanks to her faithfulness and affection, permits her old father to stay alive”

 

Some history:

Oedipus at Colone is a Greek tragedy by Sophocle, one of the last he had done. The topic is the end of Oedipus life, a legendary king of the Labdacides dynasty. Chased from Thebes after it was discovered that he had killed his father, married his mother, and putting out his eyes, Oedipus wanders aimlessly along roads, guided by his daughter Antigone: They ultimately find asylum at Colone, where they are protected by Theseus, king of Athens. Oedipus dies there for mysterious reasons, which announces a God’s protection on the city.

Antigone is the daughter of Oedipus, king of Thebes, and of the queen Jocaste who is also her grandmother. She takes care of her blind father in his exilum. She went back to Thebes after his death to marry Haemon, son of Creon. During the war of the seven leaders, her brothers Eteocle and Polynice killed each other.

Creon, brother of Jocaste, then on the throne, organized a decent mourning for Eteocle, but ordered that the body of Polynice, that he considered as a traitor, be left there where he had fallen without any care or ceremony.

Antigone, persuaded that Gods laws were superior to human decisions, decided to organize a decent mourning for her brother.

Irritated, Creon condemned her to be buried alive in the mourning cave of the Labdacides. Full of regrets, he rushed to the cave, but it was too late, Antigone had hung herself. Her husband in tears tried to kill his father, and despising him, committed suicide, followed in this act by the wife of Creon.

 

 To know more: 

 

"Pourquoi... ? toujours faire la brouette ! Non. Non. Essayez l'escarpolette. " has been shown :

- 1978, Salon de Mai, Paris.

- 1979, Rétrospective, musée de la peinture, du 16 mai au 20 août, Grenoble.

- 1979, « French Art », Serpentine Gallery, Londres.

- 1989, Rétrospective, musée "La Piscine", du 29 avril au 11 juin (prolongation jusqu’au 25 juin), Roubaix.

- 1989, Rétrospective, musée Sainte-Croix, du 3 juillet au 4 septembre, Poitiers. 

- 1989, Rétrospective, Centre Georges Pompidou, du 12 septembre au 22 octobre, Paris.

"Pourquoi... ? toujours faire la brouette ! Non. Non. Essayez l'escarpolette. " was the subject of following publications:

Vitalie Andriveau – Gilles Bernard, Alfred COURMES, Préface de Michel Onfray, le cherche midi, 2003, p. 161.

 

"Antigone et son papa" has been shown:

1979, Salon de Mai, Paris.

"Antigone et son papa"  was the subject of following publications:

Vitalie Andriveau – Gilles Bernard, Alfred COURMES, Préface de Michel Onfray, le cherche midi, 2003, p. 150.