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variety of unusual fields, from race cars to watches, lamps and guitars. After all, in front of Staub’s workshop is a garage full of old Porsche 911s. Geneva is a stone’s throw away and François feels he is pretty much in the right place: “there are, perhaps, too many cows but then again, nature is important.” Practically speaking, there is no shortage of affluent customers around here, nor of wood, be it Swiss, French or from more exotic forests in other hemispheres. Today his ten artisans are putting the finishing touches to some pieces heading for Taipei, but his heart lies in Italy, in that secret recess of the heart where all the most daring follies are conceived. L’Italie: the flipside of Switzerland, but, more sensibly, the Italy of art, history, magic and widespread charm. And, even more than Italy, Venice, a treasure chest of art and hidden visions. François dedicates his “Corte Nascosta” to Venice: a dark, imposing monolith (60 x 60 x 100), almost redolent of Kubrick, propped on a pedestal from which it lures and at the same time unsettles us. It could be termed a meuble à secrets, a secret cabinet, but only the adjective is fit to describe it. It is a mise en scène. On its two dark portals lies Venice, cast into the sea and overrun by its canals; the doors open to reveal the luminous façade of Ca’ d’Oro; behind it, a court that is a quotation of Venice in
His works are exported to far-off countries, but his heart remains in Italy: the symbolic flipside of Switzerland, representing art, history, magic and widespread charm
fragments (the floor of the Redentore church) and here, amidst spiral staircases and loggias, it begins to reveal drawers, hidey-holes and mechanisms: secrets and the places of secrets. A concealed mechanism exposes a mirror, and we find ourselves inside this magical theatre, inside this black-andwhite film. Another reveals the menacing eyes of the Condottiero Colleoni, just as he was sculpted by Verrocchio in Campo San Giovanni e Paolo. A Wunderkammer to the letter, with artifices that draw us into the game, making us a part of this chiaroscuro madness, this cinematographic journey into an artist’s dream. The pièce, presented to prospective “buyers” in a number of private performances around Europe, from Lucerne to Venice, has yet to find a purchaser, and hence remains where it was conceived. Unique and solitary. François the artisan, who makes things for others, is not satisfied; but the artist is happy, and even more so the man, because it reminds him of his daring undertaking, successfully completed. In all this self-expression, what emerges in the end is a powerful sense of artistic craft as the pure reflection of the self. Cellini’s famous Salt Cellar, as we often recall, “was” Cellini, in the renowned definition of Francis I, who commissioned the work. La Corte Nascosta “is” François Staub.
A MONOLITH WAITING TO BE UNVEILED Above, another model inspired by Escher. Top left, the hands of Pascal Cuenot, the soloist in the orchestra of artisan-artists directed by Staub; left, detail of Venice’s canals on the monolith’s doors. The creation of “Corte Nascosta” took almost ten years.
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