Since its opening in 1992, the vocation of the Bouvet Ladubay Contemporary Art Centre has been to revive the pleasure and spirit of “The Renaissance” in the very heart of the Loire Valley. The Centre d’Art Contemporain, which contains 9 exhibition rooms and a hall-library, covers almost 800 m2, on the banks of the Thouet river in Saint Hilaire Saint Florent, nearby Saumur.
“This passion for art in all its forms that has always lingered with me.”
Patrice Monmousseau
President of House Bouvet Ladubay
Behind the thirtieth anniversary of the Bouvet Ladubay Contemporary Art Center, which we are celebrating this year, lies a long and beautiful story. You will discover the passion that has driven us since the beginning, the marvellous bonds we have established with great artists and the diverse and unique art works we have exhibited.
Founded in 1851 by Etienne Bouvet, a creative genius and ambitious visionary, Bouvet Ladubay is today the leading producer of sparkling wines in the Loire Valley, exported to over forty-five countries. But the Maison possesses something extra, which it owes to its founder. From the outset, this man of culture and innovation thought big and beautiful and developed a remarkable work tool from which aesthetics has never been absent. The thousands of visitors who admire its cellars and its “Submerged Cathedral” every year bear witness to this.
The art of wine, the art of living, art full stop: for us, nothing is more indispensable to the finesse of our wines than art and artists. Nothing is more essential than what is sometimes seen as superfluous and which finds its place here, where the harmony between the wine, the site and the mind is revealed. It would be through art, a shared, open and demanding art, that our Maison would develop its outreach, strengthen its reputation and create new links from here in Saumur in the Loire Valley.
Together with our own technical services, we began the transformation of what had been municipal premises for sixty years into the unique 800-square-metre exhibition space we know today.
I later met Benoit Lemercier, a tall young man of about twenty-five, very knowledgeable, as passionate about art as he was about artists, an artist himself, who already had a few works to his credit. I decided to entrust him with the keys to our Art Center and with the programming.
Benoit quickly found his bearings, understood the soul of the site and of the Maison. Very quickly, he got into action and the dynamic he set in motion has not ceased, for thirty years, to shake up our certainties, to summon our emotions. Season after season, he has enabled us to discover and meet wonderful artists with a guiding principle devoid of complacency.
1992 to 2022: these thirty years of contemporary art in the mellow Saumur region represent an unprecedented adventure.
The challenge was to bring rare and sometimes difficult works to a diverse and mixed public – from great art connoisseurs to visitors to our cellars who came to discover our wines – without giving in to fashion. This challenge has been met.
The Bouvet Ladubay Contemporary Art Center has become a must for anyone interested in the art of our time.
And although the artworks and artists are renewed each year, although, during these three decades, times, fashions, concerns, styles and ways of thinking about the world have changed, the same light illuminates the vines and makes art radiant.
“I wanted to show contemporary creation in its diversity.”
Benoit Lemercier
Benoit Lemercier, Artistic Director of Bouvet Ladubay Contemporary Art Center, interviewed by Roxana Azimi
— Roxana azimi. How did your story begin with Patrice Monmousseau?
— Benoit lemercier. It was thirty years ago, I was a young man from Angers, twenty-five years old, an artist starting out with a passion for contemporary art. I wanted play a part in this sector. Through a friend, Véronique Levavasseur, I met Patrice Monmousseau, who had acquired the former Bouvet Ladubay buildings dating from the 19th century and constructed in dressed stone, with an Eiffel-style glass roof. He wanted to create a cultural activity there.
I jumped at the chance, with a precise idea in mind.
I immediately wanted refurbishments to be done, to have white walls, grey floors and subtle lighting. It was a long-term undertaking but Patrice Monmousseau was very open. I went to see artists I liked, François Morellet, César, Olivier Debré… They all agreed to exhibit.
— With exhibitions by artists who are sometimes at opposite ends of the spectrum, such as Adami, Combas and Opałka, the line-up is eclectic to say the least. Is this intentional?
— It’s quite deliberate. I wanted to show contemporary creation in its diversity. Each artist has his or her own vision of the world, a vision that is both political and aesthetic, sometimes humanistic and social. Each time you look at the work of a great artist, you enter a particular universe.
I have a lot of respect, for example, for the gallerist Denise René, who has defended one type of art all her life, but I’m not the flag bearer of a movement. I’m not into communitarianism. My friend Gottfried Honegger, who created the Espace de l’Art Concret in Mouans-Sartoux at about the same time as our Art Center in Saumur, was a rather dogmatic man in his programming. I often shared these views, but I aspired to more freedom in my choices.
— Why this focus on the French scene and mainly mid-career artists?
— A lot of thought went into this choice. A very strong anti-French snobbery exists that bothers me. I wanted to defend artists who have a great career behind them and are unjustly abandoned by institutions and galleries.
I fight against fads. There are many fads in contemporary art. The fashion of youthism is one of them! Artists like Vera Molnár or Jean Le Gac have had magnificent careers but don’t fit in. While, César is an artist who had a lot of success during his lifetime and is unfairly forgotten today.
Everyone promotes young people, many prizes are dedicated to them. They don’t need our centre to make themselves known, even though we recently exhibited some very talented figurative artists in their thirties with the gallerist Valérie Delaunay.
— Do you remember a special moment?
— The ten-year anniversary exhibition was
very strong, all the artists came back. It was a lovely celebration, which we couldn’t restage today because many have since passed away.
The exhibition that is close to my heart, because it corresponds to my intellectual research, is the dialogue between Gottfried Honegger and Paul Jenkins in 2011. Each of them said to me: “No, I don’t want to!” But we finally got there. These two artists had such a different view of the world. For Honegger, matter and matter alone creates the world. He draws a red circle and asks you to see a red circle, nothing else. Jenkins is the opposite, he’s a great shaman. He covers a canvas with a red paint wash and suggests that you perceive the luminous energy of a spiritual force.
— In thirty years, have you built up a collection?
— For more than twenty years, the Bouvet Ladubay Contemporary Art Center has been buying a work in each exhibition or offering financial support to the exhibiting artist for the production of a piece.
— What are your upcoming projects?
— To continue for another thirty years! I already have in mind the artists I will be exhibiting in the years to come. We are an established institution, with an appealing narrative, there is no reason to stop.
“How wonderful! The memory of this emotional shock is still vivid for me.”
Juliette Monmousseau
Managing Director of Bouvet Ladubay House.
I was just fifteen years old when the Bouvet Ladubay Contemporary Art Center opened its doors. How wonderful! The memory of this emotional shock is still vivid for me. “Never seen before in Saumur”, that was certain! I remember a very happy moment of sharing, of a particular and new energy.
For ten years, I have been participating in organising exhibitions with our team and in particular Emmanuel Guérin, who is in charge of all our events and partnerships. Year after year, we strive to highlight the commitment of a unique wine estate in the Loire Valley and that of two men, my father Patrice and Benoit, alongside the artists for the pleasure of the greatest number of people.
It has become commonplace for major wineries to develop ties with art and artists. But thirty years ago, this was an entirely original vision. We have found it very meaningful and immensely rewarding. By opening up to local schools as well as to our foreign clients visiting Saumur or to the people of the Loire Valley, our Maison has become an essential private cultural venue for our city, our department, our region and the west of France.
The Bouvet Ladubay Contemporary Art Center has been keeping spirits high for the past thirty years and, in this respect, it is very much in line with our wines in this Maison which is celebrating its 170th anniversary. We are starting this new decade with great enthusiasm!
The Artists' capsules
At Bouvet Ladubay, the muselets, whose wire cage and metal cap secure the cork ready to let the effervescent spray escape if you are not careful, can be transformed into genuine contemporary art. Interlocked and linked together, they create a light, colourful work that would inspire more than one creator. The Maison’s nod to the notion that beauty can be hidden at the very heart of what is merely useful!
Bouvet Ladubay Contemporary Art Center
Opening hours from June 1 to September 29 2024
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