Lempicka, the artist, the woman, the legend : exhibition, Boulogne-Billancourt, Musée des années 30, march 30-july 13 2006

Tamara de lempicka was a colorful personality. Painter by day and femme fatale by night, the decadent polish artist became a veritable icon of the interwar period; Both she and her work have become symbols of their era. She studied in paris under andré lhote, who had a decisive influence on her work, as did the italian masters of the renaissance. Tamara de lempicka sought to achieve a distinctive style, so that "amid a hundred others, one of my paintings should stand out at first glance." And she achieved her goal, developing a unique sculptural style. The artist's nude studies and equivocal portraits brought her fame in paris, where the sensuality and eroticism of her paintings earned her the sobriquet "ingres perverse." She became the painter par excellence of the fashionable society of the jazz age, before leaving europe on the eve of the war for the united states, where she would conquer new york and hollywood. This book-the catalogue for the first exhibition devoted to the artist in france-reveals the mystique of tamara de lempicka, who encompasses at once artist, woman, and legend.