Presentation
(Excerpt of the "Trois Traces d’Oscar" catalogue)

Between 1967 and 1990, Oscar Niemeyer, artist, poet, philosopher, writer and as it happens the most innovative and moving architect of the Twentieth Century, created three sites in the Paris Region : the French Communist Party headquarters in Paris, the Bobigny Trade Union Center and the head office of the daily newspaper "L'Humanite" in Saint-Denis.

These three "Parisian" buildings were the inspirational source for the works grouped under the title of Trois Traces d'Oscar (Three Traces of Oscar).

Thus, from November 18, 2006 to March 31, 2007, the exhibition Three Traces of Oscar took place at Espace Niemeyer (that is the exhibition hall of the headquarters of the French Communist Party, located in Place Colonel Fabien in Paris), presenting a collection of twenty-eight large canvases and a series of monoprint engravings.

Some of the paintings in Trois Traces d'Oscar helped to further unexpected encounters between the Brazilian architect and other artists. Musicians, poets, songwriters, singers and performers such as Joni Mitchell and Kate Bush. And filmmaker Stanley Kubrick.

These meetings are a symbol for some strong artistic correspondances between Niemeyer, Mitchell, Bush and Kubrick, among which one could quote primarily the singularity of an unusual and unique artistic œuvre, that each of these four artists has developed in concerned respective discipline -music, architecture or film. And also a personality characterized by a requirement of excellence, and the refusal of artistic compromises throughout their careers.