EXHIBITION: “THE BANJO PLAYER” AT POINTE-A-PITRE

Lending artworks for exhibition purposes is a beneficial means to introduce Léon Delachaux and one of the Endowment’s objectives – the mission of its Lending Committee is to arrange such opportunities.

This past summer, it was able to provide The Banjo Player – one of Delachaux’s most emblematic works – the chance to travel across the Atlantic to be displayed in the magnificent exhibition organized by the Mémorial ACTe in Pointe-à-Pitre: “Le modèle noir: de Géricault à Picasso ” (“The Black Model: from Géricault to Picasso”). In this symbolic site, a luminous homage is paid to those victims of human insanity, those who lost hope and their lives, those who survived and stood up for liberty.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We will cherish the memory of the hospitality extended to us by Jacques Martial, President of Mémorial ACTe and curator of the exhibition. Quoting Aimé Césaire, his informed and powerful commentary introduced us to the exhibit’s leading figures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Banjo Player, in cadence, introduces the exhibition’s section “En scène” (“In the spotlight”) highlighting the Afro-American rhythm and movement that revolutionized the United States and Europe. Jazz and Josephine Baker made the world dance and changed the vision of man.

Rubbing shoulders with Alexandre Dumas, Joseph (male black model for Géricault’s The Raft of the Medusa), the splendid African Venus by Cordier, Jean-Pierre Schneider’s contemporary homage to Manet’s Olympia and many others, The Banjo Player, in this way, becomes an integral part of history and acquires a new complexity. We were touched to learn that the Guadeloupean public identified with The Banjo Player as a close family member.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After its success at the Wallach Art Gallery in New York and the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, the exhibition Le modèle noir completed its circuit at the Mémorial ACTe in Pointe-à-Pitre on December 29, 2019. The Léon Delachaux Endowment Fund would once again like to thank Jacques Martial and his team for welcoming the Banjo Player on its museum walls.
 
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