The city of Rueil-Malmaison, the Atelier Grognard, and Natacha Dassault pay tribute to the photographer Olivier Dassault through the exhibition “Inspirations : Expressions Abstraites.” until January 4, 2026.
In November 2017, Rueil-Malmaison hosted “Grand Angle, from Figuration to Abstraction,” his first major exhibition in these halls, with more than one hundred photographs. He liked to say that it was his largest exhibition. This autumn, a new scenography built around some sixty analog photographs made over more than 40 years will once again be brought to light at the Atelier Grognard in Rueil‑Malmaison. By way of introduction, an illustrated biography will retrace his career: “An artist’s life across more than 50 years of photography.” His body of work is at once abundant, eclectic, and resolutely abstract. His approach remained a constant and utterly improvised dialogue with light. To bring people together and to move them was also the energy that drove him to create and express himself in complete freedom.
“Art seems to me today a means—if not the means—of reconsidering our world, of reflecting on its essence, of probing the deep truth that will have eluded us, and of doing so TOGETHER.” – Olivier Dassault, Paris 2020
In 2016, Olivier and Natacha Dassault created NAG, Not a Gallery. On the occasion of group exhibitions in this space dedicated to art, his photographs were often presented in dialogue with works by other artists. He was particularly fond of these conversations around creation. Today, Natacha Dassault has chosen to exhibit certain artists in a scenography that resonates with Olivier Dassault’s “Abstract Expressions.” Thus the works of Griet Van Malderen, Fuad Kapidzic, Kouka, Hom N’Guyen, Jonone, Rancinan, and Isabelle Girollet will be shown on this occasion.
He was also a musician, related to the renowned French composer Darius Milhaud (1892–1974). At the start of his career he composed original film scores. Reinventing the sonic emblem, he would go on to compose more than a hundred hymns for companies, institutions, and major events, excerpts of which will be played.
This new exhibition is also an opportunity to present the Olivier Dassault Endowment Fund created by his wife Natacha. The Fund’s purpose is to ensure the conservation, distribution, and promotion of the work of the photographer Olivier Dassault and of the artistic movement with which it is associated.
“A glint of light tracing the curves of a subject—this was the visual poetry Olivier loved to capture. From this ray was born a geometry that shifted with inspiration and gesture. For him, the essential thing was the encounter with light… The man who laughed with his eyes loved to sculpt light. I like to believe that his light remains.” — Natacha Dassault
From adolescence onward, photography revealed itself to Olivier Dassault as a true calling. Faithful to his Minolta XD7, this man of many talents devoted part of his life to fixing the moment on analog film. From amateur competitions to travels around the world, everything became a means to train his eye, refine his technique, and conceptualize his approach.
Over more than 40 years, his work took shape through instantaneous abstractions and improvised compositions by means of multiple exposures and in‑camera superimpositions. Gradually he freed himself from the constraint of realism and explored color and form as sources of creation.
A great traveler, he liked to absorb the ineffable energy of places and domesticated objects, creating unique and captivating visual compositions exclusively on film. By observing what surrounded him, Olivier Dassault drew closer to the origins of the elements. A pilot’s eye and his training as an engineer led him to perceive and compose images between verticality and horizontality, giving his work its distinctive character.
He photographed everywhere, wherever he found himself. Through serendipities reimagined, he forged connection, a freedom of language composing and redrawing with an infinite state of awareness. The image‑making process and its format depended on the emotion it aroused, in order to deliver all its light and depth.
His photographs have been exhibited worldwide—from Paris to New York, Madrid to Marrakech, London to Brussels—and appear in the catalogues of numerous museums and institutions, from the Bibliothèque nationale de France to the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, from the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, Texas, to the Palm Springs Art Museum in California. In 2023, his work entered the collections of the Centre Pompidou in Paris.
Although Olivier Dassault also served as a Member of Parliament in the National Assembly and held senior positions within the Dassault Group, it is his artistic career that sets him apart. His approach remained a quest driven by obsessive reflections toward the ultimate, unprecedented image. His “iconic confessions” attest to his mischievous spirit, his sensitivity, and the virtuosity of his gesture.
“Painting with light remains my credo,” he said.
Every work bears witness to a fragment of life in which light attunes itself to matter and invites us to appreciate the beauty of the world and to preserve it. The fleeting image is fixed in motionless eternity.
Chantal Dusserre-Bresson is the curator of the exhibition.
Olivier Dassault : Inspirations: Abstract Expressions
Until January 4, 2026
Atelier Grognard
6, avenue du Château de Malmaison
92500 Rueil-Malmaison
https://www.villederueil.fr/fr/latelier-grognard
