Huguette Arthur Bertrand

Biography
Huguette Arthur Bertrand

Huguette Arthur Bertrand was a French painter and tapestry artist associated with the Nouvelle École de Paris and recognized as one of the few women active in postwar abstraction. Born near Paris and raised in Roanne, she studied at the École des Beaux-Arts and La Grande Chaumière, before traveling to Prague in 1947 on a study grant, where she held her first solo exhibition. Returning to France, she quickly emerged as a pioneering abstract painter, participating in the landmark Les Mains éblouies exhibitions at Galerie Maeght and becoming a regular at the Salon de Mai. In 1955, she was awarded the prestigious Prix Fénéon, which propelled her career internationally with exhibitions in Copenhagen, Havana, Brussels, and New York.

 

Her early work shows the influence of Hans Hartung but soon developed into a distinct style defined by dynamic networks of lines, bold colors, and the powerful presence of black.

 

“What I want to achieve is both to divide space and to recreate it, to render it at once fragmented and in motion, through a linear process that tears the form without negating it,” she declared in words later cited by Michel Seuphor.

 
Over the years her painting evolved toward a more fluid and lyrical language, incorporating collage and printmaking, with a strong use of textiles that reflected her early contact with the fabric industry in Roanne. This sensitivity naturally extended into her major contribution to tapestry in the 1970s, when she collaborated with master weavers in Aubusson, producing innovative works often based on small gouache studies rather than full-scale cartoons.

 

Arthur Bertrand’s work combined rigor and freedom, geometry and lyricism, making her a central yet long-undervalued figure in French abstraction. Today her paintings, collages, engravings, and tapestries can be found in numerous museums in France and abroad, affirming her place as a major voice in the postwar avant-garde.

Works
  • Huguette Arthur Bertrand, Composition, 1957
    Composition, 1957
  • Huguette Arthur Bertrand, Cinq heures du matin, 1952
    Cinq heures du matin, 1952
Exhibitions