Tuesday, April 4, the Lycée Jean Mermoz in Montpellier hosted an event to celebrate the «Journées du 1% artistique», an event jointly sponsored by the Ministries of Culture and National Education.
In the presence of Sophie Béjean, Rector of the Occitanie academic region, Rector of the Montpellier Academy, Chancellor of Universities, and Frédéric Bourdin, Deputy Regional Director of Cultural Affairs in charge of the Creative and Cultural and Territorial Action Centres (Drac), this celebration was magnified by the participation of students and teachers in a project to raise awareness of art education and rediscover two masterpieces installed in the high school in 1972.
The works of the 1% of high schoole Mermoz
Two emblematic works have been installed at the school since 1972:
- François Rouan, "Untitled" (1971): 10 ceramic panels; wall composition, 210 m2 glass paste mosaic; François Rouan is the most prolific artist of the Hérault in the realisations of the 1% artistic.
- Marino Di Teana, "Homage to Laurent le Magnifique" (1972): it is a monumental sculpture-signal, carbon steel 15 meters high restored in 2015 by the Languedoc-Roussillon region with the help of the drac Occitanie; this work of the 1% artistic figure among the most ambitious of the Occitanie region and the most important of the academy of Montpellier.
A celebration in pltime users
The students of 3rd explained their work of creating posters and sculptures conducted with their teacher of applied arts around the two works realized in the framework of the 1% and in homage to their authors. The students, alone or in pairs, took pleasure in presenting their creations placed on the walls of the corridor leading to the documentation center, in total resonance with those of Rouan and Di Teana, to say their pride and the new look they now have on these works, the existence of which they sometimes did not even know, yet they pass by every day.
Texts in homage to the authors were also read by the students in front of Di Teana’s gigantic work.
The circuit ended with the rediscovery of Rouan’s complete and colorful work, hidden for so long by lockers fixed on the work and removed definitively in this work of reconsideration and valorization of the work.
The rewardworks of 1% in the Occitania region
Antoine Dupuy, Chargé de Mission at the Drac, was able to explain the work of the 1% Artistic made in the whole region, covering nearly a thousand works, and which resulted in the publication of a work in the collection Duo de la Drac: The 1% artistic in schools in Occitanie From architectural decoration to contemporary art.
The «1% artistic» provides for the allocation of one percent of the cost of the construction, extension, or rehabilitation of all public buildings to the realization of one or more works of art designed for the place where they are located. «These 1% artistic days» highlight all the works of art installed in schools and schools, agricultural and higher education.
