PRESS REVIEW
, issue n°738, 13 June 2008
« The Paris Public Reference Library honours Jean Gourmelin in a big retrospective of his work. As an illustrator, a cartoonist, a poster designer, Jean Gourmelin opens up a fantastic world made of stone and infinite space where the human being appears to be trying to find his way…»
, 16 June 2008 > See article
« …the exhibition ‘Jean Gourmelin’s Worlds, Drawings’ devoted to this designer and sharp humorist who is never content to represent appearances…. »
, 19 June 2008 > See article
« … through a thematic exploration, this exhibition traces the wide variety of his works, the part he played in the society of his time and his utter modernity… »
, 18 June 2008 > See article
Jean Gourmelin has built as many worlds as he had skills. Fantastic worlds made of stone and infinite space… This exhibition traces the wide variety of his works by displaying many original drawings…. »
, 18 June 2008 > See article
« …I warmly advise you to go and see this small exhibition. I discovered Gourmelin in my teenage years, when he was drawing for Pilote and designing many book covers. I particularly remember Kafka’s Metamorphosis, it impressed me as much as the novel itself… »
, 2 July 2008 > See article
« … Designer of the absurd, Gourmelin created a world that is close to surrealism and so black that it sometimes reminds us of Roland Topor or Claude Serre, a fellow glazier at the famous master Max Ingrand’s workshop… »
La Nouvelle République, 22 July 2008
« Jean Gourmelin lived in Vendôme as a child, and later married there. A great cartoonist, he is the subject of a fantastic exhibition at Centre Pompidou… Jean Gourmelin makes us laugh sometimes, smile often, think always; his extraordinary world is just next door to the everyday one, which he superbly ignores in his drawings… » Hervé Haussand
Télérama Sortir, 27 August 2008
«…a retrospective devoted to this black humour cartoonist with a sharp mind, as much influenced by Beckett as by Topor…. »
15 September 2008 > See article
«…A multiplicity of perspectives, a combination of simple and popular references and unexploited representations of reality, contribute to immerse the visitor in a (paradoxically attractive) world of anxiety and the absurd. For although the drawings are brimming with meanings and pertinent philosophical digressions, they are nevertheless exceedingly beautiful, moving, augmenting both our pleasure in looking at them and the requirements of critical reason. A good occasion to (re)discover an accomplished artist who succeeded in disclosing the insurmountable nature of the human condition…. » Thomas Yadan