Notre selection

It doesn't matter if there are two of us, seems to say Jean-Jacques Sempé on this tasty drawing where we find all his art of detail, composition and shifting. The draftsman has made himself the observer par excellence of the small twists and winks of everyday life, in the city or at the sea, from France to the United States. The infinite is in constant dialogue with the infinitesimal, solitude with the crowd, intimacy with the sociological.

With Jean-Jacques Sempé, let's rediscover the nostalgic perfume of rear platform buses. "We used to catch terrible colds but that was part of life in Paris! "recalls the designer who made Paris an inexhaustible source of inspiration. An undisputed master of the art of detail, an eternal music lover, Sempé conjures up the subtle shadows of Duke Ellington, Yves Montand or the pianist Samson François, but also memories of the political struggle between communists and anti-communists in the heyday of the 1960s.

For several years now, Soledad has been collaborating with Image Republic, creating a very colourful collection of feminine illustrations.

Whatever Jean-Jacques Sempé's drawings, there are always at least two worlds that overlap. While adults sadden by the weather, grey and dull, children enjoy and snort freely, red with pleasure and drunk with games. It's a real invitation to see life differently, and try to keep a child's look in everything, free and offbeat!

All of Jean-Jacques Sempé's subtle poetry and derision are found in this drawing. The Eiffel Tower, like an oversized beast emerging from the jungle, stands in the back of the Parisian, impressive and reassuring at the same time. With a shy look, the tiny communicates with the immense, and normality with dreams of grandeur. From the 7th arrondissement to Saint-Germain-des-Prés, Paris is a constant subject of observation for Sempé.

For several years now, Soledad has been collaborating with Image Republic, creating a very colourful collection of feminine illustrations.

Discover the French Alps by Monsieur Z, by taking the famous eggs, these gondolas from the 1970s, leading to the top of the slopes. Perfect-looking skiers wind their way gracefully in the shade of the peaks, under the eternal snow.

Drawing on the excessiveness of his favorite cities, Paris and New York, Jean-Jacques Sempé always manages to combine urbanism and poetry, in compositions that (re)reconcile the minuscule and the gigantic. So, no matter how far away the horizon may be, all you have to do is bend over and the buildings will let the moonlight escape. Let's meet up for a sweet night at the seventh skyscraper.

Seen from the old port, the bonne mère overlooks the sailboats, pointy and other boats that cross its waters. Marseilles reveals itself in all its splendor, under the pen of Paolo Mariotti, with the magnificent pink and yellow facades of the new quay, and the tangle of heterogeneous buildings, as far as Notre Dame de la Garde. From the top of her hill, she watches over the bay. For centuries, the survivors of storms or shipwrecks have covered it with ex-votos for its gracious protection.

For several years now, Soledad has been collaborating with Image Republic, creating a very colourful collection of feminine illustrations.

For several years now, Soledad has been collaborating with Image Republic, creating a very colourful collection of feminine illustrations.

A real dog's time, ideal for a walk on the bridge of arts, celebrated by Brassens. Jean-Jacques Sempé, full of mischief and poetry, takes advantage of the Parisian mists to play with reality and models, when a Parisian and his dog are unaware that they are being followed by Henry IV on his horse. The Vert-Galant watches, like a benevolent ghost, under the towers of Notre-Dame and its now defunct arrow.

“When I’m grown up, I will buy myself a classroom, but just so that I can play in it.” Goscinny invented a child’s language that appealed to children and made their parents smile. Paired with Sempé’s wonderful drawings, the stories of Little Nicholas became international bestsellers and achieved the status of classics of French literature. The small schoolboy’s success was primarily based on the amazing closeness of a magical duo: Goscinny and Sempé. The two young authors created a whole universe. “Goscinny turned up with a text in which a child, Nicolas, talked about his life with his friends, who all had strange names - Rufus, Alceste, Maixent, Agnan, Clotaire - while the assistant principal was called Bouillon (Broth). We were on the way: René had hit on the right formula”, said Sempé. Little Nicolas’ first adventure was published on 29 March 1959 in Sud Ouest Dimanche. The response from the newspaper’s readership was enthusiastic. For seven years, Goscinny and Sempé brought alive Nicolas every single week, creating 222 stories in the process. They brought alive their own childhood memories through Nicolas and his friends. “Although I was never a Gaul or a cowboy, I was a child, as was Sempé, of course. The stories were inspired by his memories and my own memories, feelings rather than actual memories, such as the smell of pain au chocolat at the end of the school day, the atmosphere at playtime, all the bustle of childhood that Sempé really and truly captured”, said Goscinny.