His build and figure, his long hair and red beard, his unrestrained laughter and mischievous eyes will not be forgotten. His father, who was a communist activist, worked as a fisherman. Born in 1943, Yvan Daumas spent his childhood and summers in Carry-le-Rouet: "He knew how to swim and dive before he learned to walk", as they say. His diploma from the Beaux-Arts in Place Carli places him at the heart of a generation that asserted itself around 1968. Among his close friends, Jean-Jacques Surian, Michèle Sylvander and his great friend Pascal Verbena are still active; Jean-Jacques Ceccarelli died in April 2017.

The happiest moments of his career were between 1972 and the early 1980s. The gallery owners of his time - Jean Puech and Jean-Luc Sarre in the basement of the bookshop La Touriale, Jean-Pierre Alis from Athanor, Noëlla Gest in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, André Nègre and Maurice Mistre in the vicinity of Cours d'Estienne d'Orves, and later the Artothèque Artaud and 10 rue des Marseillais - loved his generosity, his transgressions and his humour.

His most intimate tumults, his violence and savagery, the eruptions of his sensitivity were manifested in his painting. Except for brief forays into the rue de Seine in Paris and Pierre Chave's house in Vence, Yvan Daumas was never able to escape the provincialism of Marseilles. Some of his works were acquired by museums when Marielle Latour and Germain Viatte were directors.

In the early days, accidents and references recalled Francis Bacon and the Cobra movement. After that, an astonishing fluidity, gouaches and mixed techniques, slashes and swirls of colour gave rise to perfectly singular sensations and grammar: on his canvases, we discovered shivers, joys and frights, birds' beaks and profiles, birds of prey or palmipeds, elephants unconcerned with the laws of gravity, beasts of Lascaux and sea serpents. Later on, he carved sumptuous skulls for canes carved from wood.

« Look and close your eyes ! »

No illusions about the social contract, Yvan Daumas did not want to become a "professional". Other pleasures - for example, long hikes in search of mushrooms - periods of silence and inactivity could immobilize him for a long time. He had settled in La Fève, near Allauch; cherry trees, jujube trees and vines as well as a breeding farm of pigeons, chickens and golden pheasants occupied him. During Robert P. Vigouroux's term of office, Dominique Wallon wanted him to teach at Menpenti for adults at the Luminy-Beaux-Arts extra-curricular centre. His friend Claude Langlois told me that when his students asked him for advice, he often repeated that it was necessary to look and close one's eyes, "to let go, to paint with the eyes, with the hands".

A legend begins, it was his third heart attack. Yvan Daumas died during the night of Tuesday 13 April. For his last hours he listened to Léo Ferré, "Merde à Vauban", "La Mémoire et la Mer"; his wife Michèle and his son Yan were here.

Article published in the daily newspaper La Marseillaise  by Alain Paire, the 15th April 2021
© Photo credit : Patrick Box