239 - Claude Troin (1938–2019)

Claude Troin (1938–2019) Black felt-tip pen, c. 1967 Signed and inscribed by hand, lower right: “For Yves Guérin,” signed “C. Troin” Dimensions: Sheet 29.7 × 21 cm (11 ⅝ × 8 ¼ in.) Condition: good condition, unframed Provenance: Yves Guérin’s guestbook, compiled between 1963 and 1992 (single-owner provenance; the dedications place the collector in the casino circles of the Riviera and Dinard). Description: A large, solitary chestnut tree, drawn in black ink with an almost calligraphic energy—bold outlines and dense cross-hatching shaping the foliage and shadows. Claude Troin was a French painter of the Nice School: trained at the École des Arts Décoratifs in Nice, a friend of Ben (Vautier), and steeped in Occitan thought and Lettrism. He exhibited at the Paris Biennale (1963) and the International Art Biennales of Menton, was championed by Maurice Jardot of the Galerie Louise Leiris, and was the subject of a landmark exhibition in 1985 at the Nice Center for Contemporary Art (now the MAMAC) and a retrospective in Carros in 2000. The subject of the tree evokes the woods of his childhood in Nice. Signed and dedicated to the collector in his guestbook.