Franck Laverdin – Thirty Seven East

REVELATIONS

August 22, 2022September 24, 2022by JC AgidLeave a comment

Revelations (in French: here)
New York Exhibition of paintings and sculptures by Jean-Pierre Formica

The face’s wrinkles of painter and sculptor Jean-Pierre Formica, his eyes too, the iconic choice of words and his unexpected way of linking them together let a colorful and poetic universe surface. A desire to make the invisible visible. If his artworks were argentic photographs, Jean-Pierre Formica would be the developer, the essential chemical agent that converts the latent image into one that the eye can see.

Also inscribed on Formica’s face is the force of Camargue’s salty sun, the insatiable curiosity of a man driven by uncertainty, an almost detached look, perhaps surprised by the interest his work arouses, and a polite recognition.

A selection of Jean-Pierre Formica’s artworks will, at last, be on view in New York from September 6 to 30, 2022. Titled ‘Revelations,’ this exhibition juxtaposes recent paintings and sculptures whose teared papers for the former and accumulations for the latter give “form to the formless.”

They “reveal” to paraphrase the artist.

Continue reading “REVELATIONS”

Révélations

August 16, 2022September 24, 2022by JC Agid1 Comment

Révélations, Entretien avec l’artiste Jean-Pierre Formica

Les plissures du visage du peintre et sculpteur Jean-Pierre Formica, ses yeux aussi, le choix méticuleux des mots et sa façon inattendue de les lier ensemble laissent apparaître à la surface un univers coloré et poétique, une volonté de rendre visible l’invisible. Si cette œuvre était une photographie argentique, Jean-Pierre Formica en serait le révélateur, l’agent essentiel qui permet à l’image d’apparaître et se figer sur le papier.

Il y a aussi inscrit sur le visage de Formica la force du soleil salé de la Camargue, la curiosité insatiable d’un homme mû par l’incertitude, un regard presque détaché, surpris peut-être de l’intérêt que son œuvre suscite, sa reconnaissance polie.

Une sélection des œuvres de Jean-Pierre Formica sera visible à New York du 6 au 30 septembre 2022. Cette exposition, « Révélations », juxtapose des peintures et sculptures récentes dont les déchirures pour les premières et les accumulations pour les secondes donnent « forme à l’informe ». Elles « révèlent » pour reprendre l’expression de l’artiste.

Continue reading “Révélations”

About Courage and Women: The Story of Rita Wilson’s Mother

April 22, 2019April 22, 2019by JC AgidLeave a comment

About courage and women | The Story of Rita Wilson’s mother
Rita Wilson’s acceptance speech at the Anne Morgan Women of Courage Award
American Friends of Blérancourt – New York, November 9, 2018

“We are lucky to live in a world where we’re surrounded by women of courage,” the actress, producer, singer and songwriter Rita Wilson said the evening she was bestowed with the Anne Morgan Women of Courage Award by the American Friends of Blérancourt. “At the time when we celebrate the centennial of the end of World War I, we wanted to honor and recognize women of exceptional talent and commitment to empowerment of women throughout the world,” explained the President of the American Friends of Blérancourt Countess Dorothea de la Houssaye.

Telling the story of her own mother, the producer of Mamma Mia and My Big Fat Greek Wedding, emphasized the need to tell the stories of women around the world whose actions, just like the ones by Anne Morgan, defined what we can all individually accomplish.

“That’s something Anne Morgan understood well,” explained Wilson. “She spent her extraordinary life on the front lines: as a union organizer in 1910, as a volunteer ambulance driver during World War I, as a philanthropist who stayed and helped France rebuild long after others had left.

But Anne Morgan also believed in the power of telling stories. As one of the first women documentarians, she knew that if you want to solve a problem you have to shine a spotlight on it, and sometimes point a camera at it. And you can’t just tell us about the world you hope to see – you have to show us, in the way that only a work of passion and creativity can.

And then there are the women – millions upon millions of women – whose stories we may never know: mothers who face overwhelming danger to build a better future for their children; girls who risk their lives just to go to school; working women everywhere who break through glass ceilings large and small. The quiet, humble courage that sustains them each day is an inspiration to all of us.”

Here is the story of Rita Wilson’s mother.

Continue reading “About Courage and Women: The Story of Rita Wilson’s Mother”