Louis Durot Pouffesses Chair, Signed, 1990

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Designed and crafted by French Pop Artist, Luois Durot, this piece is sure going to be a conversation piece. Is … Read more Designed and crafted by French Pop Artist, Luois Durot, this piece is sure going to be a conversation piece. Is it a tongue? Is it a bum? It's called the Pouffesses chair and it's definitely a fun piece that makes a bold statement in any room!

While the chair is certainly a bold piece of functional pop art, it looks fantastic in the gallery, flanked with a Vladimir Kagan cloud sofa, and Paul Evans cube table (as photographed). We also have this piece among Olivier Mourgue, Pierre Paulin and Verner Panton pieces and not only does this piece hold its own, it makes a statement. This piece would look incredible in any modern, mid century modern, or contemporary environment.

Louis Durot, born 1939, is a French pop artist who narrowly escaped deportation in 1943 by missing the train to Auschwitz. Gathered in Magagnosque ( Alpes-Maritimes ), it is there that he discovered the pleasure of sculpting the earth and making objects from it.

In 1960, he enrolled at the Faculty of Science, where he obtained a diploma in “propaedeutics – Maths 1 Mécagène”. In 1963, he became a "gluer" for two months and then an engineer at Equipiel, where he was responsible for calculations and resistance measurements to develop prototypes of nuclear power plants. When the French branch was abandoned and became a research company, Equipiel offered him a one-year training in organic chemistry. Between 1966 and 1972, Louis Durot was at the head of a dozen research contracts.

In 1964, Louis Durot founded the Freelane Studio which aims to bring together artists from various disciplines with common artistic expectations. The Freelane Studio thus brought together the jazz journalist Gilles Brinon, the painter Jean Ihallero, Maxime Defert... It was thanks to them that Louis Durot met the painter François Arnal , who introduced him to the French sculptor César in 1966.

Louis Durot becomes César's assistant for a year, in order to put his qualities as a chemical engineer at his service. In César's studio, he improves his knowledge of polyurethane foam and the artist's foam creations, his expansions.

Thanks to César, Louis Durot met Pierre Restany (founder and mentor of the New Realists group founded in 1960), Arman and Robert Malaval . These frequentations are determining for Louis Durot who discovers the medium and the artistic practice through his new friends. It was in 1968 that Louis Durot designed his first works. Period sketches reveal a phantasmagoric world made of mushrooms and carnivorous plants. This new activity requires space and he therefore sets up his workshop at 35 rue Léon in the 18th arrondissement of Paris.

Wishing to find a way to create definitive objects in a material that was more flexible, colourful, resistant and immutable, Louis Durot continued his research by creating the polyurethane chemical company Durgalith in 1972, which he sold in 1997 to the company SOPREMA . Louis Durot is still today the director of “polyurethane research” at Soprema and is behind the filing of hundreds of patents 1 . Louis Durot is also an engineer specializing in polyurethanes for Shinjuker in Beijing . See less