Pierre Molinier

Pierre Molinier (Agen, France 1900 - Bordeaux, France 1976) was a French Surrealist painter and photographer.

Life

1900 Pierre Molinier was born on 13 April 1900 (Good Friday) in Agen (France). His father was a house painter and decorator specialized in marble and wood imitation; his mother was a dressmaker and his aunt an ironer. During his childhood, he was raised surrounded by women. He spent his school years with the Brothers of the Agen Ecoles chrétiennes, and not at all, as he pretended, with the Jesuits.

1913 He starts working with his father as an apprentice painter and takes evening courses at the Agen Municipal School of Drawing.

1918 Having been in love with his sister for a long time, he takes a photograph of her on her deathbed. Around that date, he settles down in Bordeaux, Place de la Bourse, in the Saint-Pierre Quarter.

1919 He sets up his own business, as a house painter.

1920 He does his military service from 1920 to 1922, then stays in Paris where he visits museums frequently

1923 He moves to 5 rue du Parlement-Saint-Pierre, still in the Bordeaux Old Quarter.

1927 First exhibition of his paintings. Until 1951, every year he shows several paintings figurative or fauve landscapes and portraits) in the Bordeaux Salons.

1928 He exhibits a painting in Paris, at the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts, and founds the Société des Artistes Indépendants Bordelais together with several other painters.

1931 He moves in the apartment where he will stay for good, 7 rue des Faussets, in the Bordeaux Old Quarter

1940 He is mobilized as a male nurse, taken prisoner, then demobilized. He settles down in the Bordeaux countryside with his family. Giving up figuratism, he makes his first abstract painting Satin blanc.

1944 His father commits suicide, by taking medicine.

1946 Following the presumed visit of the Dalai Lama envoys, who asked him to reproduce mandalas, his inspiration changes into esoterism (this visit was dated, vaguely, around 1936 by Molinier ; considering the evolution of his paintings, 1946 would be much more likely.

1948 First painting characteristic of his erotic period (Les amants à la fleur).

1949 His wife leaves the marital home.

1950 He builds his "Premature tomb" topped by a black cross engraved with "Here lies/Pierre MOLINIER/born on 13 April 1900 died around 1950/he was a man without morals/he was proud of it and gloried in it/No need to pray for him." He takes photographs of himself, posing in his studio as crucified and having committed suicide, as well as on his deathbed, in his apartement.

1951 He breaks off with the Artistes Indépendants Bordelais, following a scandal at the Fall Salon caused by his veiled painting Le grand combat, representing an entanglement of bodies engaged in a love joust.

1952 He gets in touch with André Malraux in order to exhibit his paintings in Paris. His daughter Françoise, with whom he has been in love for a long time, leaves the family apartment.

1955 He writes to André Breton and sends him a portfolio containing photographs of his works. André Breton falls in love with "those magical works" and sends him a series of enthusiastic letters ("You are today a master in vertigo").

1956 After exhibiting 18 paintings (and a few drawings) at the Paris gallery run by Breton A l'Etoile scellée (27 January-17 February), he contributes to several issues of the magazine Le surréalisme, même. He meets the writer and poet Joyce Mansour, "the Divine". He starts taking erotic photographs.

1957 Near Bordeaux, he buys a shady bar (the Texas-Bar) for his so-called "natural daughter", Monique, who was a notorious prostitute.

1960 He slaps his wife in the face violently, fires above the head of his cousin and spends a month in prison. He gives up his house painting business in order to devote his time to his art.

1961 He is condemned (fine and damages) for the 1960 events. His wife gets a divorce.

1962 Shooting of the Raymond Borde film Molinier (in Bordeaux, private screenings in 1964 and public screening of the censured version in 1966).

1964 He writes to Emmanuelle Arsan (author of the erotic novel Emmanuelle), and then meets her in Paris in December. Both engage in a passionate correspondence and Molinier represents her in several of his works.

1965 Numerous meetings with the Surrealist painters Clovis Trouille and Gérard Lattier. Shooting of a rudimentary film, Mes jambes.

1966 His plans for publishing an album of photomontages on Le chaman et ses créatures begin to take shape. Roland Villeneuve is approached for writing the preface. Many publishers will give up printing the album, which will be published eventually in 1995.

1967 Second meeting with Emmanuelle Arsan, in Bordeaux. As a result of his correspondence with Peter Gorsen, he meets Hanel Koeck, a German fetishist of legs and shoes, who is also a sado-masochist. Beginning of a lengthy and passionate correspondence with her. She will pay him several visits and will become the model of many paintings and photomontages. Shooting of the Jean-Pierre Bouyxou's film Satan bouche un coin.

1969 He orders the exhumation of his father's corpse and keeps his bones inside a wooden box in the shape of a small coffin, rue des Faussets. An album (Molinier) on his paintings is published by Jean-Jacques Pauvert.

1970 Removal of his gall-bladder, which hurts him at regular intervals.

1972 He bequeaths his body to the Faculty of Medicine, in order for it to be dissected. Peter Gorsen publishes in Munich an album of photographs and photomontages (Pierre Molinier, lui-même), with an essay in German.

1975 In March, he takes a series of photographs of the young Swiss painter, Luciano Castelli, in transvestite, and another series with Thierry Agullo, a Bordeaux iconoclastic artist, on the theme of Indecency. At the end of the month, Peter Gorsen pays him a visit (for the first and unique time), accompanied by Hanel Koeck. In September, his son Jacques dies in an accident (he made a mistake while manipulating explosives). He resumes his contacts with his daughter Françoise.

1976 At the end of February, he takes a series of photographs of Thierry Agullo in transvestite on the theme of Androgyny, He commits suicide by shooting himself in the mouth, on 3rd March 1976, at about 7.30 p.m. His body is transferred to the Bordeaux Morgue, then to the Faculty of Medecine. After being dissected, his remains have been buried in a Bordeaux cemetery.