Biography of Jean Lurgat 
1892 
July ıst, birth of Jean Lurcat in Bruyeres, Vosges; high school in Epinal; 
then Nancy University. 
1912 Forsakes medical studies for painting. 
1914 Enlisted in infantry. 
1916-17 
1919 
1921 
1923-25 
Wounded, he is evacuated to Roanne. He has his mother execute his first 
canvas stitches tapestry an aquarelle. 
Discharged. Immediate departure for Geneva. Holiday in the Tessin with 
the musician Ferrucio Busoni, Jeanne Bucher, Rainer-Maria Rilke, Hermann 
Hesse. 
Sets and costumes of ’Celui qui reçoit des gifles’ by Andreiev, for the 
Pitoeff Company. 
Trips in Spain, North Africa, Sahara, Greece, Asia Minor. Those vast and 
denuded spaces impress him and will inspire him for a long time. He finds 
in cubism and surrealism answers to certain preoccupations. 
1927 
He has four canvas stitches tapestries executed for the living-room of 
Mr. P. David Weill and ’L’Orage’ for Mr. Georges Salles. 
1928 Stays in Greece, Rome and New York. 
1933 
1936 
1937 
1939 
yr’, 
Works in New York. First tapestry, ’L’Orage’ executed at Aubusson for 
Madame Cuttoli. 
Spain. First tapestry executed on high-warp loom at the ’Manufacture 
nationale des Gobelins': 'Les Illusions d’Icare’. 
First meeting with the weaver Francois Tabard of Aubusson. Second 
tapestry ’Forêts’ executed at the Gobelins. He then sees in Angers the wall 
hanging ?’L’Apocalypse’ and decides to devote his life to tapestry. 
m 
September, the war breaks out. With Gromaire and Dubreuil, he settles in 
Aubusson where he was commissioned by the Department of National 
Education to oversee a number of requested tapestries. He has the new 
technique definitely perfected; counted shades, big stitches, strong weaving. 
1940 Weaving of about 20 tapestries in the Tabard and Goubely factories. 
Co-operation with Andre Derain and Raoul Dufy.