Ian Hamilton Finlay
Matisse Chez Duplay, 1989
Neon
With Julie Farthing
210.2 x 122.1 x 7 cm
The neon reads:
The chamber
of the deputy of
Arraz contained
only a wooden
bedstead, covered
with blue damask
ornamented with
white flowers,
a table, and four
straw bottomed
chairs.
The 1789 – 99 French Revolution is a key theme running through Finlay’s work. The text in this piece describes the room Robespierre rented from cabinetmaker and revolutionary Maurice Duplay after martial law prevented him from returning to his own lodgings.
Robespierre ended up staying ‘chez Duplay’ for several years during the height of his political career. The words are taken from History of the Girondists (1847) by Alphonse de Lamartine, a poet and politician who helped found the Second Republic a generation after Robespierre and Duplay. The words are formed in fellow artist Julie Farthing’s handwriting.
Interested in the power of words and how histories are written, Finlay’s neon poems are an integral – though lesser-known – part of the artist’s oeuvre, since Finlay is mainly remembered for his stone inscriptions. In his practice Finlay juxtaposed myths, characters, philosophy or images from the past to create new ideas. In this case, the inclusion of Matisse in the title suggests that the simple yet ornamental room could be in the style of this artist. A point perhaps underscored further by rendering the words in the same blue used by Henri Matisse in his cut-outs.