Serge Charchoune

Biography

Serge Charchoune
(1888, Bougourouslan Russia - 1975, Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, France)

In 1912, after having deserted the military service in Russia, he arrived in Paris and joined the studio of a cubist painter Henri Le Fauconnier's. After the declaration of war in the August of 1914, he took refuge in Barcelona where he met the boxer-poet Arthur Cravan, painters Albert Gleizes, Marie Laurencin and Francis Picabia, and Josef Dalmau, an antique dealer passionate of the avant-garde art. Thanks to the latter, Charchoune exhibited abstract painting he called himself "ornamental" (1916 and 1917).

In May 26th, 1920, he attended the Dada Festival in the salle Gaveau and met Picabia. He frequented the Dadaist meetings in the café Certá ( passage de l'Opéra) and participated in Dada events, including the "procès Barrès " organized by André Breton in May 1921.

In Berlin, in 1922, he exhibited a new series of paintings called "ornamental cubism". He met Russian artists disappointed by the revolution, including the dancer Isadora Duncan. Charchoune gave up on coming back to the USSR and went back to Pairs (1923). After he met Amédée Ozenfant, he adopted a purist style. From 1954, his work became more and more abstract, almost monochromatic, inspired by music.

Although he never joined another artistic movement, Charchoune never denied his adherence to Dada .

Exhibitions selected

2006 - Serge Charchoune,  Pouchkine Fina Arts musuem, Moscow
2006 - Serge Charchoune, Musée d'Etat Russe, Saint-Petersburg
1989 - Charchoune, Centre culturel de la Somme /Musée départemental de l'Abbaye de Saint-Riquier
1913 à 1965 -  Musée de l'Abbaye Sainte-Croix, Les Sables-d'Olonne
1971 - Rétrospective, Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris

Collections

Musée de Brou, Bourg-en-Bresse
Musée des Beaux-Arts, Dijon
Musée de Grenoble
Musée des Arts contemporain, Hornu
Musée d'art moderne et d'art contemporain, Nice
Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Paris
Musée national d'Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris
Musée d'art moderne et contemporain, Strasbourg
Musée d'art moderne Lille Métropole, Villeneuve-d'Ascq