Jean GORIN

Jean Gorin (1899-1981): Neo-Plasticism, Reliefs and Original Screenprints

Jean Gorin was France’s foremost follower of Piet Mondrian and one of the most inventive heirs of De Stijl. Born in 1899 at Saint-Émilien-de-Blain, near Nantes, and dying at Niort in 1981, he took Neo-Plasticism off the flat canvas and into relief, space and architecture, admitting the circle and the diagonal that Mondrian himself refused. The art historian Yve-Alain Bois records that Mondrian regarded him as the only French Neo-Plasticist. Gorin is collected by the Centre Pompidou, the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam and the museums of Nantes and Grenoble, and his original screenprints are the most accessible way to own his work.

Le Coin des Arts currently offers two original screenprints by Gorin: Constructions Plan (1972), published by Galerie Denise René in an edition of 175, and an Untitled composition numbered from an edition of 100, both signed in pencil. Each was chosen for the crispness of its flat colour, the accuracy of its primaries, clean margins and a clear history.

A Self-Taught Painter in the Loire Valley

The son of a shoemaker, Albert Jean Gorin spent his formative years at Nort-sur-Erdre, north of Nantes, painting while earning his living by other means. His formal training was short – brief spells at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière in Paris and the École des Beaux-Arts in Nantes – and he was largely self-taught. Around 1922 reproductions of Matisse, Van Gogh and Cézanne made a deep impression; in 1923 a visit to Paris showed him Cubist painting at first hand, and he read Gleizes and Metzinger’s Du « Cubisme ». The decisive jolt came at the 1925 Exposition des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, where Le Corbusier’s Pavillon de l’Esprit Nouveau and the work of Fernand Léger pointed him towards a constructed art. That year he painted his first abstract picture.

Discovering Mondrian, 1926-1930

In 1926 Gorin came across Neo-Plasticism in Vouloir, a small review published in Lille, and began corresponding with the Belgian sculptor Georges Vantongerloo. His first Neo-Plastic canvases date from that year. He then called on Mondrian in Paris and, back in Nort-sur-Erdre, remodelled his own interior on De Stijl lines, so that walls, furniture and colour formed a single space. His first exhibition, with the Stuca group, was held in Lille in 1928. From 18 April to 1 May 1930 he showed with Cercle et Carré at Galerie 23 in the rue La Boétie, alongside Mondrian, Kandinsky, Hans Arp, Sophie Taeuber-Arp, Kurt Schwitters, Serge Charchoune and Le Corbusier.

From Relief to Construction

From 1930 Gorin gave his compositions physical depth. In these ‘flat reliefs’ incised lines and stepped planes let cast shadow become part of the picture, a move Mondrian welcomed as a bridge between painting and architecture. Gorin also broke the strict right-angle rule, introducing first the circle and then the oblique. A fine example, Composition néoplastique avec lignes en creux n° 32 (1934), painted at Nort-sur-Erdre, was bought for the French national collection in 1979 and is now at the Centre Pompidou. In 1932 he travelled to the Soviet Union, where he encountered Russian Constructivism and the work of Malevich. A member of Abstraction-Création, he moved in 1937 to Le Vésinet, outside Paris, after selling his house and destroying much of his earlier work.

War, Réalités Nouvelles and Late Recognition

Called up in 1939 and taken prisoner of war, Gorin later lived at Grasse, where he ran a shop selling decorative objects. In 1945 he took part in ‘Art concret’ at Galerie René Drouin, and from 1946 he was among the artists of the Salon des Réalités Nouvelles, founded by Frédo Sidès and driven in its early years by Auguste Herbin. Recognition came late: his first solo show was at Galerie Colette Allendy in 1957. Retrospectives followed at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Nantes (1965), the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (1967) and the Centre National d’Art Contemporain, Paris (1969). After 1965 his ‘space-time constructions’ opened the relief fully into space. He designed his own house at Niort, a white cube, his only realised building. Galerie Denise René showed him in 1974, Nantes held a second retrospective in 1977, and the Centre Pompidou exhibited his drawings from 12 October to 12 December 1977. He died at Niort in 1981.

Gorin and Britain: Structure and the London Market

Gorin’s British connection runs through the post-war ‘constructionist’ movement. He was among the contributors to Structure, the journal on constructionist art founded in 1958 by the Dutch artist Joost Baljeu and the Canadian Eli Bornstein, whose circle included the British artists Anthony Hill, Stephen Gilbert and Gillian Wise. Baljeu had met Gorin and was influenced by him. That network was revisited in London in 2017, the centenary of De Stijl, when the Mayor Gallery of Cork Street, in collaboration with Borzo of Amsterdam, presented De Stijl reSTRUCTUREd at Frieze Masters, including works by Gorin. In Britain, his work is mostly encountered through London dealers and the continental market.

Gorin’s Prints: Screenprinting and Neo-Plastic Colour

Gorin was not a printmaker in the traditional sense, and his printed work is limited, consisting mainly of screenprints from the 1970s. The medium suits his language perfectly: unmodulated flat colour, hard edges, pure red, yellow and blue against white, grey and black. The sheets most often seen are those published by Galerie Denise René in Paris, such as the Constructions Plan series, square sheets of about 68 × 68 cm in editions of 175, signed and numbered in pencil. A few colour lithographs are also known. The standard reference is Marianne Le Pommeré’s trilingual catalogue raisonné, L’Œuvre de Jean Gorin / The Works of Jean Gorin (Waser Verlag, Zurich, 1985); we know of no separate catalogue of the prints, so there is no conventional reference number of the ‘Mourlot 345’ kind. Describe a sheet by title, date, publisher, edition and dimensions. For the basics, see what is an original print and the printing.

Collecting Jean Gorin Prints: A Buyer’s Guide

Edition. Check the pencilled number (for example 22/175) against the publisher’s stated edition. Artist’s proofs and hors commerce impressions exist but are a minority.

Signature. An original impression is hand-signed in pencil; see the signature. As Gorin died in 1981, no signed sheet can be later than that.

Paper and margins. The square format and white margins are part of the design. Measure sheet and image, and be wary of trimmed or toned paper.

Condition. Large screenprinted areas show every scratch, scuff or fingerprint, and reds and yellows can fade in daylight. Inspect the sheet in raking light and frame behind UV-filtering glazing.

Provenance and pitfalls. A Denise René invoice or a reputable dealer’s receipt is valuable. Exhibition posters, catalogue reproductions and plates from 1930s reviews are not original prints. See our authenticity guarantee and framing service.

We select Gorin’s prints for impression quality and condition. Related artists: Auguste Herbin, Hans Arp, Victor Vasarely, Max Bill and Geneviève Claisse. Browse modern art and our prints and lithographs.

Sources and further reading

Marianne Le Pommeré, L’Œuvre de Jean Gorin / The Works of Jean Gorin / Das Werk von Jean Gorin, Waser Verlag, Zurich, 1985 · Serge Lemoine and Marianne Le Pommeré, Jean Gorin, exhibition catalogue, Musée de Grenoble / Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1998 · The Mayor Gallery – Jean Gorin · The Mayor Gallery – De Stijl reSTRUCTUREd, Frieze Masters 2017 · Encyclopædia Universalis – Yve-Alain Bois, ‘Jean Gorin’ · Centre Pompidou – Composition n° 32 · Stedelijk Museum – Relief spatio-temporel No. 42