Michel MACRÉAU (1935-1995), "Untitled", acrylic on paper mounted on canvas, signed "m.m. 89" middle right. Annotated on the back on the stretcher: "Collection Madame Clerc". Bears a label from FIAC PARIS, Grand Palais, 1989 and a stamp from the Galerie "Jacques Barbier et Caroline Beltz" on the stretcher. H. 158 x 97 cm Born in Paris into a modest family, Michel Macréau trained as a draughtsman and then worked as a decorator in a pottery workshop. Very quickly, his abundant and spirited works met with a certain success. In a language close to that of graffiti, combining text and falsely naïve figuration, he creates obsessive, sometimes shocking figures that reflect anguish, nostalgia and intimate trauma. An exhibition catalogue states that this "calligrapher of modern tales, of tales from the street, paints the tragic in the colours of everyday life". And indeed, between the countryside and the city, Michel Macréau lives a precarious street life, sometimes squatting, sometimes depressed, giving his free and impertinent artistic universe a wild veracity. Provenance: Provenance FIAC 7/15 Oct 1989 Galerie Jacques Barbier - Caroline Beltz. Collection Catherine Clerc-de Goumoëns