Memphis group founding member Nathalie Du Pasquier on her books

Date
14 January 2015

Last week Apartamento’s co-founder and art director Omar Sosa mentioned an upcoming collaboration with artist Nathalie Du Pasquier in his Bookshelf feature, and purely by chance this week we have Nathalie herself running us through her favourite books. What a nice coincidence!

The French-born, Milan-based artist has worked as a designer – she was one of the founding members of the Memphis group, designing postmodern furniture, textiles, carpets and objects from 1982 until 1987 – and now specialises in painting, designing a collection for American Apparel and dabbling in printed matter as well as using her brushes to create the repeating patterns and bold shapes her name has become synonymous with.

When it came to choosing a selection for her Bookshelf, Nathalie didn’t have an easy time of it. “It’s difficult to choose five favourite books!” she explained. “Some of my favourites are not in the studio, or they’re not very visual. Then my love for certain books of course changes each day… We are allowed to be unfaithful!” As a solution, Nathalie has “chosen books to do with looking, and which are related to what I do” for her Bookshelf feature. And it’s a seriously good one.

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Calasso: Il Rosa Tiepolo

Calasso: Il Rosa Tiepolo

Il Rosa Tiepolo is a wonderful book by Calasso. It was given to me by a friend and, as I was not particularly attracted by Tiepolo, even though I knew he was a great painter, it stayed on my table for a year before I opened it. Then, I was captivated.

What remains of my initial reading is the understanding that looking at paintings is a dialogue, it has to do with talking about things you would not talk about otherwise, and it has to do with philosophising. Calasso takes you into the paintings, he looks at them in a way no art historian ever does, because he talks about what is represented.

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Sottsass: Scritti

Ettore Sottsass: Scritti

For me, reading Sottsass’ writing is a way to hear again the voice of someone who was quite fundamental for the young girl I was when I first met him. The way he talks seems quite simple, and I say " the way he talks" because he writes in a similar way to how he speaks. He drew in this way too. A poet and an intellectual but not academic at all, he was the first adult of his kind that I had met, and of course I wanted to be like him. Time has passed, and a lot of things have happened in my life, but Sottsass remains one of the important influences.

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Guy de Cointet: Guy de Cointet

Guy de Cointet: Guy de Cointet

I was given this book by my sister about three years ago. I knew nothing about Guy de Cointet at the time. Since then I have learned he is one of those artists who has been rediscovered and has become extremely trendy.

For me this is a very fresh book. When I first read it I was in a moment where I felt I had to change things in my practice. I am a painter, and for years I have painted every day. All of a sudden that wonderful activity that I was almost not thinking about anymore because it was happening so naturally, seemed disconnected with my time.

I like this book because even though I am not a performer, it took me outside myself in a playful way. In the end, an artist is free to do whatever he believes is right. Thanks Guy!

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Philippe Lebaud: Le Coeur d’Amour Épris

Philippe Lebaud: Le Coeur d’Amour Épris

Le Coeur d’Amour Épris is a book I have had for years. It has lived through a flood in the studio and I took great care to dry every page so it is still just about together. It is a book of 15th Century miniature paintings by a French painter who is just identified as “le Maitre du Coeur.” It is beautifully reproduced in facsimile. It’s a book of love, where all the participants have symbolic names (Désir, Doulce Mercy, Amour, Fortune…) At the beginning of the 80s when I was given this book, I liked the names so much that I named some of the objects I designed after them.

Apart from the romantic aspect of this very Medieval story, what I really love in the book is the fact it is a book of French painting. I have lived abroad since I was 18 years old, and it is very touching to identify the Frenchness of these miniatures, to situate French style between Italy and northern Europe and to recognise in these very old images landscapes and a nature which are typical of France.

At that time it was very new to represent nature and natural light. These paintings have a certain naivety that great Italian painters have long since abandoned, but also a way of inventing representations which are very touching for a painter, and which work perfectly. Plus the paintings form a book, and I have been very interested in the process of making books for many years.

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Charlotte Perriand et la Photographie: L’Oeil en Eventail

Charlotte Perriand et la Photographie: L’Oeil en Eventail

This is the newest of my selection, a book I bought just a year ago and which I have looked at very often since then. It’s a book which looks at a young and very talented woman who was well known for her design work and her collaboration with Le Corbusier, but less for other things she did, in particular before going to Japan. She was a great photographer: her photos are at the origin of many of Léger’s paintings, which I love.

She and Léger have collaborated in installing numerous pavilions, mixing photos, paintings, and graphics. In this moment I am interested in realisations which combine different media and here the result is very convincing.

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Nathalie Du Pasquier’s Bookshelf

Above

Nathalie Du Pasquier’s Bookshelf

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About the Author

Maisie Skidmore

Maisie joined It’s Nice That fresh out of university in the summer of 2013 as an intern before joining full time as an Assistant Editor. Maisie left It’s Nice That in July 2015.

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