Creation Pelletier / Benjamin Pelletier

‘Working with clay has always been part of my life. I’m a pure product of free expression. Modelling and enamelling are natural and instinctive for me.’

Georges Pelletier was a French ceramist and artist born in Brussels in 1938, who died on February 12, 2024. He graduated from the Ecole nationale supérieure des arts appliqués et des métiers d’art in Paris and, before his death, he passed on all his skills to his son Benjamin, with the aim of seeing his art live on through him.

In 1961, he opened his first workshop in Paris, where he created his first unique pieces. His talent was spotted by Maison Bobois, and he became their supplier from 1961 to 1973. After this period, he moved to the south of France (Cannes), where he set up his new workshop shared with his son, until the end of his life.

His productions are imbued with his rich learning process in the studios of Fernand Léger and Claude Pantzer, where he also met architect and designer Charlotte Perriand, with whom he exchanged ceramics. His work is easily identifiable by its use of ceramics as a sculptural material, but also by its use of the solar form as a source of inspiration. His works let in subdued light, transforming them into almost dreamlike objects.

For Private Choice 2024, a series of small-format mirrors, totems, floor lamps and sculptural lamps will be presented. These ceramic pieces feature solar forms in keeping with the aesthetic developed by the artist throughout his career. The openwork lamps take on the appearance of photophores, bathing the room in soft light. The mirrors surmounted by glazed ceramic rods respond to this desire to bring the sun into interiors, in a metaphorical and poetic way. These vintage-looking objects oscillate between art and design, being both contemplative works of art and purely functional elements.