From Persia to Arabia, the creative explorations of Cartier

From Persia to Arabia, the creative explorations of Cartier

The tiara, a platinum structure at the top of which sparkle with beautiful diamonds, is made of rock crystal engraved with sophisticated windings. But these did not fall from the sky and the Cartier house, which created the object in 1912, was not struck by the divine thunderbolt of creation: these arabesques are in truth repeated feature for feature from the Grammar of Ornament, by Owen Jones, an 1856 manual which compiled patterns from Persia, China and Arabia. This is just one example among many of the tasty correspondences that the Museum of Decorative Arts (MAD) is staging, from October 21, in the exhibition “Cartier and the arts of Islam”. De Perse en Arabie, les explorations créatives de Cartier De Perse en Arabie, les explorations créatives de Cartier

The project goes back a few years. “Showing the way Cartier has been nourished by geographical and cultural elsewhere has already been the subject of around thirty exhibitions, recalls Pierre Rainero, director of style, image and heritage of the jeweler. The influence of China and Japan had been studied, that of India or Persia in part, but the connections with the arts of Islam in the broad sense, never. However, the archives, the documents so powerfully suggest these links. »

So here is Pierre Rainero in 2016, whispering his idea to curators. The brand, flagship of the luxury group Richemont, will open its funds wide to allow real scientific work, he promises. Several museums are approached. But it is a co-production between the MAD and two other establishments which hold departments devoted to the arts of Islam, the Louvre in Paris and the Museum of Art in Dallas, which wins the bet.

Mini-police investigation style

Any novice eye can believe that he perceives reminiscences of Islamic arts in Cartier jewels of the 20th century, as the pieces are so laden with arabesques, scrolls, ocelli, fleurons, merlons... "The combination between blues and greens, turquoise from Iran and lapis lazuli from Afghanistan, also raises questions: it was an explosive assembly at the start of the 20th century , unheard of in the Art Nouveau taste of the competitors at the time", underlines curator Evelyne Possémé, curator head of the jewelery department at MAD. But clues are not enough. “It was necessary to carry out an irreproachable verification, to track down the aesthetic origins of these pieces. »

This is where a methodical research task began for the four commissioners, like a mini-police investigation. Three years of tracking on two continents. Without police custody but with magnifying glasses to better appreciate the documents and gloves to handle the jewels, the oldest of which date back to 1904.

De Perse en Arabie, les explorations créatives de Cartier

In France, the archives and the library of the house, elements of the Islamic art collection of Louis Cartier, as well as the Charles-Jacqueau collection (creative director from 1911 to 1935) kept at the Petit Palais, were examined. The teams were thus able to establish striking resonances between jewelry and pieces of art, coming from a time when we did not yet speak of cultural appropriation – that is, the fact of blaming designers of Western fashion and objects to borrow shamelessly or credit from foreign cultures for profit. On the contrary, the exhibition underlines the thread of the inspirations of Louis Cartier, Jacques Cartier and Jeanne Toussaint. "Finding the source of a piece is a rare satisfaction", like a plot resolution, admits curator Judith Henon-Raynaud, chief curator of heritage at the Louvre.

A project for a compact in gold and sapphires around 1920 borrows explicitly from a ceramic mosaic from Iran dating back to the 15th century. The motif of a case from 1924, in mother-of-pearl and turquoise, edged with pearls and diamonds? It is in fact an exact reproduction of the shape of a 19th century Iranian box in wood and metal marquetry. The same goes for the merlons of the brooches or, later, the flowers of the pendants or adornments.

Jade and gemstones

Because, over time, inspiration mutates. “We know that Louis Cartier had a library of various works, started by his grandfather, and that he had access to numerous exhibitions and to the Islam rooms of the Louvre, recalls Judith Henon-Raynaud. Moreover, he lived in pre-war Paris, which at the time was the hub of Islamic art. »

The marvels of his collection that the hanging brings together in part for the first time since their dispersion – rare manuscripts from Harvard, pencil cases, an ivory lid from the Metropolitan Museum, a Mughal jade sprinkler encrusted with precious stones… – are left “available to Cartier designers to inspire them. Rubbing drawings prove that they sometimes traced patterns directly on the object”.

The sequel, notably under the artistic direction of Jeanne Toussaint from 1933 to 1970, made India a nerve center of fascination. “Jacques Cartier forged close relations with the maharajas from the 1910s, India being key because it was a supplier of fine pearls which would represent up to 60% of the house's turnover between the two wars”, says Evelyne Possémé. These close ties will contribute “to jewels worked more in volumes and to the birth of the famous Tutti Frutti”. The latter, which have become a Cartier signature, will hold an entire showcase of the exhibition at MAD.

Collectors' items (in April 2020, a bracelet was again torn off for 1.23 million euros at Sotheby's), they are characterized by the engraving of their emeralds, rubies and sapphires. “A tradition carried over from the Mughal era, when emeralds were sculpted into flowers or leaves,” says Evelyne Possémé. Yet another trace of history absorbed by a Parisian jeweler who has always looked elsewhere to feed its globalized windows.

Cartier and the arts of Islam. At the sources of modernity, at the MAD, 107, rue de Rivoli, Paris 1 er . From October 21 to February 20, 2022. Offer beautiful Pandora jewelry at low prices with a Pandora promo code

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Valentin Perez

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