- Goudji
Goudji, born in Georgia on July 6,
1941 , is a Frenchsculptor andgoldsmith .Biography
Goudji was born in
Soviet Georgia and spent his youth inBatumi with his family. His father was a doctor and his mother was a Professor of natural science. He had an elder brother, by two years. He studied sculpture at the Art school ofTbilissi between 1958 and 1962. He left Georgia in 1962 forMoscow , where he started a career of sculptor, while dreaming of becoming a goldsmith.In 1969 he married Katherine Barsacq who worked at the French Embassy in Moscow. He moved to France in January 1974 after five years of personal intervention on his behalf by President
Georges Pompidou . He became a French naturalized citizen in 1978. InParis he made jewelry and decorative objects for art galleries.Artworks
His artwork combines the technique of the dinandery with hard stone incrustations in metal. His first work consisted of brooches and
torques . He then went on to create canthares, aquamaniles, rhytons, pyxides and animal figures. He hammers thin sheets of metal.In 1976 he created the academician's sword for
Félicien Marceau . He has created other swords forHélène Carrère d'Encausse ,Raymond Barre andMaurice Allais .His works are exhibited in art galleries and museums, in France and abroad. They are offered by the French Presidents of the Republic,
François Mitterrand ,Jacques Chirac orNicolas Sarkozy , to Foreign Presidents.The majority of the civil pieces are preserved in private collections. Several museums have some: Museum of decorative Arts of
Paris , Museum Mandet deRiom , Dobrée Museum ofNantes , Museum of decorative Arts ofLyon , Museum of the Castle ofBlois in France, Kunsthaus Dr. Hartl inFreising in Bavaria orVatican Museums .Liturgical work
In 1985 he created a
Baptismal Font and a Pascal candlestick for the Abbey of Epau and the National Committee of Sacred Art, which now resides in theNotre Dame de Paris .Between 1992 and 1996 he designed twenty five works for the Notre-Dame
Cathedral of Chartres , all registered in the Inventory of Patrimony. In 2008 he created twenty-five new works (sacred vessels, candlesticks, ciboire), which make Chartres's collection one of the most important collection of Goudji liturgical works in France.He has provided work for several cathedrals, abbeys and churches:
Luçon Cathedral (1995); Abbey ofSt Philibert at Tournus (1999)La Trappe Abbey of Soligny (2000), Saint-Pierre de Champagne on the Rhone (2000); theCambrai Cathedral (2003), the Abbey ND of Belleville in Beaujolais wine (2004); Friburg (2004); the Basilica Sainte Clotilde (2007) in Paris. He creates baptismal fonts:Notre-Dame de Paris (1986), Saint-Jean de Montmartre (2007), Saint-Pierre de Champagne, of large monstrances of procession:Lourdes , Puy in Velay, sticks of abbot and bishop: abbot of Saint-Maurice de Clervaux (1994), abbot of Triors (1996), Champagne abbot on the Rhone (2000), Mgr Jean-Louis Bruguès (Rome), Mgr Herve Giraud (Soissons), reliquaries: Abbey of Sept-Fons (1998), St Philibert at Tournus, Cathedral of Cahors (2002), the crowns of light: St Philibert at Tournus (2002), collegial Saint-Liphard of Meung-sur-Loire (2004), eucharistic doves:Chartres ,Blois ,Vendôme , chalices: Notre Dame du Haut deRonchamp . In 1999 he produced the reliquary of Padre Pio, a gift of the Minor BrothersCapuchins to the popeJohn Paul II on the occasion of the beatification ofPadre Pio . The Pope carried this on his cape at the opening of the holy door ofSt Peter's Basilica of Rome. Other works for the Minor Brothers include sacred vessels, the cross of procession, the monstrance, the lantern, the censer and its shuttle with incense, as well as the cover of the "évangéliaire". In 2008 Goudji created the crystal mounting of the reliquary for the translation of the saint on April 24, 2008 in San Giovanni Rotondo in Pouilles in Italy.Bibliography
*Marc Hérissé, “Goudji”, Paris, 1993,
*Stephane Barsacq, Bernard Berthod, “Goudji”, Paris, 2002.
*Daniel Rondeau, Jacques Santrot, “Goudji, the magician of gold”, Paris, 2007External links
Official site of Goudji [http://www.goudji.com]
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