Jean-Michel Frank
The Absolute Silence of Luxury
“If there is one name that dominated the very last years before the war in interior design, it is indeed [Jean-Michel Frank]” — Jacques Lassaigne
Working between Paris, New York and Argentina, Jean-Michel Frank (1895–1941) designed perfectly proportioned furniture and lighting — free from superfluous ornamentation and decoration — for an elite roster of clients who appreciated his spartan design aesthetic. A melancholic child of the haute-bourgeoisie, his idea of simplicity extended to everything, including his wardrobe, having owned forty of the exact same grey flannel suit, which he wore daily (unless attending costume balls, when he dressed in drag, usually in a white gown). Affecting an imperious demeanour that was accented by his quiet manner, “Voilà, my work is done, now you can start ruining it,” he’d say to clients, upon completion of one of his minimally furnished interiors. For the first project he undertook, for a friend, he wrapped tables in galuchat (1920); the combination of simple lines and exotic materials, the very embodiment of his “renunciation aesthetic” (in the words of François Mauriac) proved an instant hit. Although he had no formal training, Frank was a connoisseur of the decorative arts, and drew inspiration, amongst other sources, from ancient Egypt, Louis XVI, and the art deco movement of the era. According to Frank, “the noble frames that came to us from the past can receive today’s creations.” Although his furniture was rooted in a tradition of French decorative arts, from early on in his career, he never had an allegiance to any particular craft (such as Eileen Gray (1878-1976), who was a student of lacquer and Pierre Chareau (1883-1950), who favoured the use of wrought iron). His signature look came to be known as luxe pauvre, and his refined, subdued sensibility was soon a favourite amongst the Parisian elite, with patrons including the Vicomte Charles de Noailles, the businessman and politician Nelson A. Rockefeller, the couturier Elsa Schiaparelli and the perfumer Guerlain. Conceivably, Frank’s calm, pared down interiors offered them a respite from the chaos of interwar Europe.
Jean-Michel Frank Rock Crustal Lamp, paper shade, circa 1925 Photograph: ©Phillips
Jean-Michel Frank Obsidian Lamp, paper shade, circa 1925 on a mica-covered table Photograph: ©Phillips
Frank's pursuit of rigorous, simple forms, graphic in their clarity, can perhaps be seen to most striking effect in his lighting designs. He favoured a classically modern mix of understated luxury, combined with exotic and unexpected materials, which for Frank were a means and not an end. His contemporaries in the Union des Artistes Modernes (UAM) may have shared his love of materials, but for Frank, it was nothing short of a fascination. From straw to mica, plaster, terracotta, galuchat, obsidian and vellum, he chose his materials for their varying textures and colours, much as a painter chooses paints, each contributing to the overall decorative effect. With his rock crystal lamps, for example, Frank left the material in its rough-hewn state, placing them on side tables and sometimes, less conventionally, directly on the floor. He used a number of rock crystal lamps in the home of the arts patron and iconoclast Vicomtesse Marie-Laure de Noailles, dotting them throughout the parchment-clad sitting room of the Hôtel Bischofsheim, her grand Belle-Epoque mansion (1926). (Frank had the interiors of the hôtel photographed by Man Ray (1890-1976) before the vicomtesse had installed her art and other personal accessories, preferring it to remain spartan.) They can also be seen in Templeton Crocker’s penthouse (1929) as well as in Adolphe Chanaux’s apartment (1930). In the latter two interiors they were placed with great precision, their coarse, upright, crystalline forms like the rocks, representative of mountains (each with their own esoteric meaning) in a Japanese Zen garden. Perhaps, like a Chinese scholar’s rock, these elements of an interior landscape were intended to inspire and encourage contemplation. Indeed Frank was heavily inspired by Asian art, and to that end, he incorporated subtle motifs into a number of his designs, and more obviously so with his “Pagoda” side table (1930). To similar effect, Frank also used obsidian, a natural glass, long admired and adapted for artistic purposes (it was inlaid into the eyes of ancient Egyptian mummies, and used for mirrors by the Aztec civilization of the New World); placing his obsidian lamps in the music room he designed for Cole Porter (1928) and in Claire Artaud’s apartment (1936).
Jean-Michel Frank Large “Block” Table Lamp, circa 1928 Photograph: ©Phillips
His mica-covered “Block” lamp is but another example of the innovative use of materials that was so central to the success of his practice. An evocation of the austerity of Frank’s particular brand of pared back modernism, the designer covered a simple rectangular block of wood in a grid of mica sheets. The physical properties of mica have been revered by artisans since ancient times. A natural mineral, it cleaves cleanly into perfectly flat sheets, making it an ideal material for glazing windows, as the ancient Romans did. It also has a natural metallic lustre (just like Frank’s rock crystal and obsidian lamps) that was admired by Japanese artisans who would inlay it in lacquer, and apply the luminous powder to block prints. Frank’s reverence for the material was akin to that of his ancient predecessors, reserving its use for only his most important commissions, such as the sitting room of Noailles’, where he clad the fireplace surround entirely in mica (1926). The same treatment appeared again in Templeton Crocker's San Francisco penthouse (1929). Similar mica-covered tables can also be seen in the designer’s own smoking room (1938).
Frank’s “X” lamp was executed in several materials, including metal and wood, but also, more unusually, in terracotta. In keeping with his modernist contemporaries, such as Jacques Adnet (1901-1984) and Marc du Plantier (1901-1975), the designer did not subscribe to any particular hierarchy of materials. He employed traditional methodologies, but used them in novel ways, for example covering walls in straw marquetry and upholstering furniture in canvas. At the time terracotta, also known as red earthenware, was traditionally associated with building materials, such as bricks and tiles; if used in decoration, it would be glazed, as with faience. Frank used terracotta in its raw, unglazed state, and in this respect he broke entirely with tradition. Perhaps the most subversive in Frank’s repertoire of provocative materials, it created a startling juxtaposition when seen in the context of his refined interiors.
Frank’s use of terracotta can also be seen in his collaborations with Alberto Giacometti (1901-1966). The artist would design over seventy objects for Frank, including seventeen lamps, eleven floor lamps, thirteen vases, ten wall lights and other small accessories, including terracotta candle holders (c. 1930). Giacometti considered his decorative works for Frank to be as important as his sculptures, explaining in a 1962 interview with André Parinaud: “For my livelihood, I accepted to make anonymous utilitarian objects for a decorator at that time, Jean-Michel Frank ... it was mostly not well-seen. It was considered a kind of decline. I nevertheless tried to make the best possible vases, for example, and I realized I was developing a vase exactly as I would a sculpture and that there was no difference between what I called a sculpture and what was an object, a vase.”
Jean-Michel Frank Large "X" Table Lamp, circa 1928 Photograph: ©Phillips
Frank’s collaborations were unusual, and something that set him apart entirely from his contemporaries. Early on in his career, impressed by the sets that Georges Braque (1882-1963), Henri Matisse (1869-1954) and Picasso (1881-1973) had created for the Ballets Russes, Frank had remarked, “I wish one could see more artists collaborating in arranging houses, the result would be, at the very least, something of our time, and alive.” Once he had sufficiently established himself in the design world, he actively pursued such collaborations with contemporary painters and sculptors, such as Salvador Dalí (1904-1989), Alberto as well as his younger brother, Diego Giacometti (1902-1985), Fernand Léger (1881-1955) and Christian Bérard (1902-1949). He was the only designer of the period to maintain and promote such avant-garde artists (the closest counterpart was Myrbor, a company run by collector and patron Marie Cuttoli, which produced carpets based on images by Picasso, Dufy, Miró, Léger, and Arp) and in doing so, it captured the attention of the press. La Flèche de Paris compared him to Louis XIV's chief architect: “Like Mansart in times past… [Jean Michel] Frank has gathered around him as craftsmen the best of today's young artists.”
Just before the occupation of Paris in June 1940, Frank fled to Buenos Aires. On a trip to New York in 1941, plagued by depression, he threw himself from the upper floors of an apartment building and ended his life. He received a mere 100-word obituary in the New York Times and soon slipped into obscurity. By 1963 the art magazine L’oeil headlined an article, “Jean-Michel Frank, a Forgotten Decorator.” In the 1970s, Frank was rediscovered by the first generation of Art Deco collectors, including Andy Warhol (1928-1987) and the arts publisher Sandra Brant (b. 1955). The “dean of interior decorators” Billy Baldwin (1903-1983), in his 1972 monograph, described a Frank-designed white bedspread as “entirely patternless, entirely colourless, and entirely breath-taking — full of the magic of texture on texture.” Now celebrated internationally as the apostle of Modernism, “Le phénomène Frank” only continues to gather momentum, with even his accessories now fetching astronomical prices at auction. One exponent of grande luxe modernism so aptly encapsulated Frank’s oeuvre as the “absolute silence of true luxury”.