Jacques Villeglé
© Philipp Hugues Bonan
« The laceration represents for me this primary gesture; it is a guerrilla of images and signs. From a furious gesture, the anonymous passerby deflects the message and opens a new space of freedom. For me, the lacerated posters brought art closer to life and heralded the end of the painting of transposition.»
© Philipp Hugues Bonan
Jacques Villeglé, born Jacques Mahé de la Villeglé in Quimper on March 27, 1926, is a French painter and sculptor. He is one of the founding members of the New Realists, and is considered the leader of the affichistes. Today, he lives and works in Saint Malo.
Jacques Villeglé began studying painting and drawing at the Beaux-Arts in Rennes, where he met Raymond Hains, whom he would follow in his endeavors. In parallel, he worked for a time for an architect: he then became familiar with the issues of urban planning and public space. From 1947 to 1949, he enrolled at the Ecoles des Beaux-Arts in Nantes and took courses in architecture, before settling in Paris.
At the beginning of his career, Jacques Villeglé collected objects on the beaches of Saint Malo and created sculptures. It was from 1949 that he began collecting torn posters. He then called himself an «affichist» and proclaimed the «guerrilla of signs». In 1958, he wrote an essay on torn posters, Des Réalités Collectives, a precursor to the manifesto of Nouveau Réalisme. It was in 1960 that Jacques Villeglé joined the Nouveau Réalistes, along with Martial Raysse, Yves Klein, Arman, Jean Tinguely, Raymond Hains, Dufrêne and Spoerri. They advocated «new perceptive approaches to reality» and an art that was non-technical and close to what one finds on the street. Jacques Villeglé declared: «My concept was to prove that a new race of non-technical artists could exist.» In 2007, he experimented with sculpture using traditional techniques (bronze, glass), but also industrial techniques (corrugated steel, polished stainless steel, mirror, cast iron). With Raymond Hains, Jacques Villeglé appropriated the abstract and lyrical tears of the city. He incorporated a dose of political protest into his works, and détourned advertising and the press. His works are popular and testify to the life of an era (political, social, cultural context).
