The Card Game - dated 57

Oil on canvas signed and dated lower left.

Dimensions: 130 x 195cm, 

Roger Chastel gives us a peaceful and cheerful family scene, sparkling with its tangy colors. 

A family is gathered around a table on which decanters, bottles,   glasses and fruit are arranged; testimonies of a family meal just ended. The atmosphere is relaxed; the father seems to be doing card tricks on his two boys who only have eyes for the game; the mother, leaning on the table, is a thinker and is resting. 

Roger Chastel, as usual, stylizes and simplifies forms, he uses flat areas of paint which can make the painting difficult to read at first glance. It is situated between abstraction and figuration, we can qualify it as “abstract figurative”.

The shades of color in yellows, oranges and ochres are successful and harmonious; the painter here demonstrates his talents as a colourist.

Student of Ranson Academy and JP Laurens.

In his work strongly influenced by cubism, he seeks the essential through synthesis and refinement.

He painted one of the panels of the Palace of the League of Nations in Geneva near Vuillard, Roussel and M.Denis. 

He was a respected professor of the Beaux-Arts in Paris. 

He participated in numerous personal and group exhibitions and represented France at the Venice Biennale in 1952.