JE DORS, JE TRAVAILLE by Valentine Schlegel

A collection of works by French sculptor Valentine Schlegel. It was published in 2017 at the CAC Brétigny exhibition. The author has worked between Paris and Sate, and has been inspired by nature to create primitive and sophisticated sculpture works. He acquired a wide range of techniques, such as a Swiss Army knife that combines various tools, and began working on daily necessities that offer a glimpse of sculpture, such as wooden flat plates, ceramic vases, leather bags, and plaster fireplaces. While collaborating with writers who were also friends, the designs were born one after another, regardless of the innate hierarchy. From fantastic pieces to everyday items, the sizes and uses were incredibly diverse. In particular, architectural works and works that are rooted in everyday life are often fixed in the place where they are used, which is one of the reasons why the author's works have not been well known.

This fourth edition of the book reveals a different side of art by showing the lives and works of the author, who can now be considered the most representative author of the 1950s. In addition to illustrations and archives, it also includes text by sculptor and Schlegel researcher Hélène Bertin. This book reveals the full story of the author, not only the main sculpture works, but also the interior and architecture that gives off a sense of the interplay between life and sculpture as mentioned above, and the approximately 100 fireplaces created for individuals by the author from 1959 to 2002. A collection of works by French sculptor Valentine Schlegel. It was published in 2017 at the CAC Brétigny exhibition. The author has worked between Paris and Sate, and has been inspired by nature to create primitive and sophisticated sculpture works. He acquired a wide range of techniques, such as a Swiss Army knife that combines various tools, and began working on daily necessities that offer a glimpse of sculpture, such as wooden flat plates, ceramic vases, leather bags, and plaster fireplaces. While collaborating with writers who were also friends, the designs were born one after another, regardless of the innate hierarchy. From fantastic pieces to everyday items, the sizes and uses were incredibly diverse. In particular, architectural works and works that are rooted in everyday life are often fixed in the place where they are used, which is one of the reasons why the author's works have not been well known.

Valentine Schlegel developed her constantly changing daily art practice between Paris and Sète. Like a Swiss Army knitfe, she occasionally mastered several techniques, producing every day objects with sculptural shapes that include wooden flatware, ceramic vases, leather bags, and plaster fireplaces. Designed without any inherited hierarchy, and often in collaboration with the artist's friends, this body of work is made up of objects in a range of sizes and uses, from the fantastic to the quotidian. Schlegel also created many architectural elements in plaster intended for home interiors. Because of their immovable nature, these sculptures for every day life are also the reason why Schlegel's work has remained little known. If she did not address only the world of art exhibitions through her work, she was nevertheless part of historic events at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs at a time when the Pompidou Center did not exist.

Today, through Schlegel's practice, this publication, conceived as a "bio-monograph" devoted to Valentine Schlegel, seeks to highlight other addresses of art. Including new iconography and archival material, with biographical notes written by Hélène Bertin that provides readers with a clearer picture of both Schlegel and her approach, this reference monograph documents for the first time all of the fireplaces that Valentine Schlegel created for private homes—about one hundred from 1959 to 2002. The other aspects of her work are also discussed in order to understand the whole of her practice, intimately linked to her way of life, where the questions of autonomy of production and friendship are central.