AM Mouron, known as Cassandre

Without knowing it, I encountered my first "Cassandre" poster when I was a child, when my father was telling me about the work of his maternal grandfather, who was the boss of the Poyet Frères printing house in Paris in the 1930s. They were the printers of the first "Nicolas" posters and it is the famous "Nectar" character, created by Dransy in 1922, that 100 years later everyone still finds in the communications of the famous spirits brand. Without really understanding it, this poster struck me with its hypnotic graphics. It left an imprint on me, probably the seed of my love of images. Having indirectly made my job, I found Cassandre many years later, in Marrakech, by installing a reproduction of the famous YSL (Yves Saint Laurent) monogram on the pediment of the museum dedicated to the great couturier. So, once I became a printer in turn, what could be more natural than to find this "childhood friend" again. It is Roland Mouron, grandson of AM CASSANDRE, who is today the rigorous guardian of his grandfather's work. It is thanks to and because of the Air France posters that we met. I rediscovered, on this occasion, the fabulous work of Adolphe Mouron and the character as talented as he was enigmatic. I believe that he revealed himself entirely through two of his quotes: "I have been driven all my life by two innate dispositions: a need for formal perfection that imposed on me a work of craftsman conscious of his duties as well as his limits, and a burning thirst for lyricism eager to free himself - Contradictory impulses that are difficult to reconcile these days. " "It seems to me now that I would have less to fear ridicule in telling you that I love beauty terribly and that it is from this unsatisfied love that I am dying..." These are the words of a man whose commitment to respecting his ideas was total, a quest for the absolute, which I see very clearly in his work. Succeeding in translating and transmitting one's values through form is proof of an incredible talent.

For more information, visit www.cassandre.fr