Jacques Monory, For All That We See or Seem, Is a Dream Within a Dream

Behind the blue glass, I am protected from bullets. Blue is not the color of fear for me. It's the color of the dream

La Figuration narrative

A new movement appeared in the 1960s, Narrative Figuration. Also called Critical Figuration or New Figuration.

In 1964, the Daily Mythologies exhibition presented at the Museum of Modern Art in the city of Paris, (in reference to Roland Barthe's book Mythologies) shed light on this new trend, far from abstract art and Pop Art.

34 painters of various nationalities but all residing in Paris are exhibited there. Jacques Monory is one of them.

The representation of contemporary society is the major theme, taking up reflections on the consumer society for example. Cinema is also a source of inspiration.

Jacques Monory

Jacques Monory is one of the pioneers of the Narrative Figuration movement. He defined himself as a "romantic lost in a world without romanticism.

At one time I thought that painting could also have a social impact (...), that painting could be part of changing the world, maybe it still is, I can't say today. (...) I don't want to save the world, I want to save myself.

Jacques Monory is inspired for his painting by facts of society or facts of winter but in fact to return to his own introspection.

Blue

Lots of pain but filtered by the blue that characterizes his paintings. This blue which would be like a balm on his anxieties or neuroses of our world.

This blue also refers to cinema and cinema inspires Jacques Monory.

Blue in Pierrot le Fou by Jean Luc Godard in 65, Le Grand Bleu by Luc Besson in 88, Mulholland Drive by David Lynch in 2001 or Avatar by James Cameron in 2009.

For All That We See or Seem, Is a Dream Within a Dream.

The title of the painting refers to a poem by Edgar Allan Poe A Dream within a Dream.

Extract from the poem:

Receive that kiss on the forehead!
And since it's time to leave you
So it's high that I admit
You are not wrong, you who judge
That my days have been a dream;
And if the hope has fled
During the night or during the day
In a vision or in none
However, is it less gone?
EVERYTHING we see or appear
Is just a dream within a dream

This painting, like a catharsis, reveals a painful moment in his life, the separation from his partner.

You can find his works on his website: https://www.jacquesmonory.com.