Maximilien Fortier took over as director of the Cérès Franco Museum in Montolieu (Occitanie) on August 19. The museum, closed for renovations, plans to reopen in 2026. The young director is a graduate of the Ecole du Louvre and the University of Paris Saclay, and a former student of the Institut national du Patrimoine (2022). He was previously director of the Musée de l’Echevinage. He replaces Cécilia Matteucci, the interim director of the museum.
The new venue, which will open in 2026, was designed by the architectural firm Passelac & Roques, known for its contribution to the Soulages Museum in Rodez. The exhibition spaces will be enlarged. Opened in 2015 in a former wine cooperative, the Cérès-Franco Museum was closed in 2022 for expansion and renovation work. The budget of 5 million euros is partly financed by the Region. Owned by a public interest group (GIP, bringing together the Region and the Department), the museum is a cooperative created to accommodate the donation of gallery owner Cérès Franco, who died in 2021.
The collection includes 1,651 works by 348 artists, of which about a hundred are exhibited. Cérès Franco was a French gallery owner and curator of Brazilian origin. She opened the L’Œil-De-Bœuf gallery in 1972 in Paris. The collection is very eclectic in terms of the choice of artists (of 56 different nationalities) and the diversity of mediums. It contains painted and sculpted works, but also drawings and engravings from the second half of the 20th century, including pieces of art brut, the Brazilian avant-garde and CoBRA with artists such as Yvon Taillandier, Corneille and Chaïba Talal. “She championed artists who didn’t go to school. These were people who made art with what they had at hand and created works that she championed throughout her career.”explains Irène Daniaux of the association for the promotion of the Cérès Franco collection, reports Franceinfo.
