Frigidaire Art

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Georges Mathieu has an individual technique. He stares at the challenging surface until inspired, then attacks it, furiously painting with brush, knife and the tube itself.


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Jean Cocteau and his arresting designs

I was there...

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If you stop to think about it, people have often decorated the common utensils of daily life. Greek potters baked scenes of sport, battle and family life onto plates and bowls used in the households of ancient Attica. Craftsmen of the Black Forest carved and painted articles of bone and wood. Why not refrigerators?

In 1958, René Lherbet, GM France Advertising Manager, came up with the idea and asked French artists to do some original work on plain white or solid colors kitchen refrigerators. Lherbet’s colleagues showed a lively interest. Together they developed a plan to have a number of Frigidaire cabinets decorated.

Sheet Metal Canvases

As the plan finally matured, it was simple and appealing. Each of ten artists would be asked to decorate one of ten cabinets contributed by GM France. The cabinets would be displayed in an art salon in Paris and ultimately be sold at auction. The original decorations by well know French painters would presumably command high auction prices. Proceeds of the auction would be divided between the artists and the French Center for the Protection of Children.

From the first, Maître Maurice Rheims, one of the leading commissaries priseurs of France (professional men qualified under law to auction art objects) took a great interest in the project. Through his wide acquaintance in the art world he was able to enlist painters and to make the necessary arrangements with the Galerie Charpentier in Paris for a ten day exhibit.

Challenge to the Painter

Interest among the artists themselves was genuine and serious. Each of them was a professional artist of reputation and achievement. Jean Cocteau, poet, author, film director, painter and one of the immortals of L'Académie française (French Academy) was the most eminent. Bernard Buffet, the youngest, had been hung where ever modern art is appreciated. J.M. Atlan had canvases in American and European galleries. Jean Cocteau has been exhibiting in France and abroad since 1930. George Mathieu, was a rage of the salons, somewhat as Picasso was. Felix Labisse, Leonor Fini, Francis Bott, Kostia Terechkovitch, Capuletti – all pondered the modern refrigerator during April and May, 1958 and produced work in their individual styles.

Everyday Art

Opening night at the Galerie Charpentier on June 26th, 1958 attracted 1200 persons to an exhibit called The Nobility of Everyday Objects. Several museums lent examples of decorative art: china utensils of the eighteenth century, painted musical instruments of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, glass and plates decorated by artists of the past and present, Mathematical instruments, tapestries and a chest. The refrigerators shared the same gallery.

Mr. Cocteau’s arresting designs and those of his fellow painters stopped show visitors for long looks of admiration and amusement at these latest “triumphs over the negative.”

Atlan and Bott lean on their works of art. Cocteau's and Buffet's are behind them. Terechkovitch stands behind his and Cocteau sits on the floor. Fini's is against the wall. Mathieu perches on his, Labisse stands beneath and, at right - the Capulettis


Jose Manuel Capuletti, Spanish born Parisian, saw the Frigidaire cabinet as a house in the South of France. The horizontal panel suggests a balcony railing. His wife modeled the girls
Felix Labisse at his home, surrounded by his collected curios, he stands with praying mantises that dance under a broiling sun
Leonor Fini was born in Buenos Aires. She paints portraits and decors. To her, the refrigerator was a Chinese lacquer box on which to draw cats





"M. Edouard Morot-Sir, right, cultural counselor to the French Embassy in the United States, with Edward Riley, General Manager of Overseas Operations. M. Morot-Sir sponsored an exhibit in New York of ten refrigerators decorated by leading French painters. Four hundred people - diplomats, art dealers and critics, press writers and GM Overseas executives - attended a private preview at the Wildenstein Gallery on October 6, 1958." The refrigerator in this image was painted by Russian born French artist Kostia Terechkovitch.







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