Blending talents
CONTEMPORARY ART MEETS INDUSTRIAL DESIGN IN SAINT-ÉTIENNE. THE MUSEUM’S VISIONARY CURATORS HAVE GIVEN EXPRESSIVE DIGNITY TO PHOTOGRAPHY AND DESIGN, AND THE POWER OF MEMORY IN FRANCE AND ACROSS THE WORLD
by Vincent Lemarchands
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THE MUSEUM OF
IDEAS The institution of the museum of Saint-Étienne was not accomplished by the State, as was the case in other important cities in France between the 18th and 19th centuries. On the contrary, it was the result of generous donations from many different collectors. Up until 1890, and with the sole exception of the Oudinot arms collection, the museum possessed only a cluster of minor donations and contributions. In that year, Marius Vachon, a curator who was almost certainly inspired by William Morris and Hermann Muthesius, proposed the creation of a new Musée d’Art et d’Industrie. It would lie somewhere in between a museum and a school: an innovative cultural centre for the arts and the industry, a place where factory workers and the economic and industrial protagonists of the city would find artistic resources and references. A place where everyone could learn about the arts and aesthetics. Marius Vachon launched this new paradigm, but the resistance and reticence he had to face made him abandon his post the following year, certainly prematurely. In fact, it was necessary to wait another 60 years before Maurice Allemand, visionary curator and promoter, arrived to stir the old institution. It was 1947, and the museum had by then moved to the Palais des Arts. Allemand was a talented manager, and he successfully multiplied the museum’s acquisitions, obtained deposits from the State, collected legacies and donations, enriched the art collections and bridged many of the museum’s gaps. Picking up from where Vachon had left, he extended the existing collections of arms and ribbons to embrace the third local industrial tradition: bicycles. Undoubtedly, what enabled Maurice Allemand to project the museum’s collection on the European scene was modern art and, in particular, his openness towards post-war America, which was the reference point of the Avant-gardists. In 1967, after 20 years of outstanding exhibitions, Allemand left the museum and its collection in the hands of a new curator, 27-year-old Bernard Ceysson. Following in the footsteps of his predecessor, for thirty years this
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