The 26 paintings on canvas of this series, exhibited at the gallery in 2004, mark an essential step in the artist’s journey within the History of Art.
In this series, Condo decodes the structure of the paintings of the great masters whom he admires, and focuses on the symbolic character of the compositions, like on the large diagonals of David’s heroic portraits or on the role of the shadows within Manet’s and Velasquez’ paintings.
Thanks to this analysis, Condo manages to capture the expressive power and the message of these works, of which he reinterprets the compositional structure to apply it then to its characters, notably to the Cardinals.
Their physiognomy concentrates in them all the grotesque of an epoch that Condo is reflecting, reminding us so that the artist goes back into the past to go further into the future.

Bilingual French & English text by Peter Fleissig, Editor of Powerhouse in Memphis.