Page 4 - OSG: Jeanne Maze: 2024

JEANNE MAZE

I first met Jeanne Maze when I was a frequent visitor to Paul
Maze’s studio between 1976 and 1978. I was doing research
for my book Paul Maze, The Lost Impressionist and I often
noticed with amusement how his young granddaughter
would observe his every move, watching his long bony fingers
running effortlessly over paper, covering the surface with
delicate powdery pastel colours.
To us both, it appeared as a miraculous explosion of
life and colours. Jeanne told me that her grandfather refused
to teach her how to use his precious pastels. Instead, he
exhorted her to compare all tones of colour and observe
every detail, as well as the changes the light inflicted on
them. She learnt that lesson well.
Brought up in London by Anglo French parents, she
went straight from the French Lycée to the Byam Shaw Art
School, London. She started her artistic career after her grandfather approved of the chinoiserie
mural she painted secretly in her bedroom!
After a successful career as a chinoiserie muralist in England and the US, she embarked on a new
adventure as a painter learning the art of gouache and oil painting.
She had many exhibitions in London and travelled to many countries for inspiration. She and her
husband, Robert Churchill, departed for France with their two sons in 2006 to the family property and
vineyards in Cognac which her mother had asked her to manage. In this exhibition you will witness
the culmination of her work both as an accomplished artist and as an imaginative entrepreneur.