Art in the Open Air at Le Muy


09/02/2022

In this village in the department of the Var, private foundations and estates full of sculptures attract the cream of the art collecting crop each summer. It’s a different way of doing business.



by Alexandre Crochet

Venet Foundation - Robert Morris, "Wheels II," 1963-1988, Corten steel. Photo courtesy of the artist and the Venet Foundation
With the ongoing nature of the health crisis, the Var’s dream of a handful of influential gallerists and artists seems timelier than ever. Here you are not faced with tightly packed crowds or a worrying proximity to others, but rather with enormous verdant estates where the summer heat is more merciful and where you can find sculpture parks to peruse in the fresh air. Places that cultivate a nice inner circle of neighbors, regulars and figures from the art world, but which open up, upon appointment, to enthusiasts who are just as keen to discover both the bucolic haven for the great names of the art market and the masterpieces that are hidden there. All these art-world figures, buying up plots and turning them one by one into open-air museums, have thoroughly transformed Le Muy, which has become both a popular and privileged artistic spot. It was in the 1980s that Enrico Navarra, a dealer of Basquiat and Haring, was the first to set up shop. Later on, it was the turn of the sculptor Bernar Venet , who created a haven to magnify his monumental creations. Much later still, in 2015, the Parisian dealer in contemporary art Jean-Gabriel… Click here to read more