#dureau

Finished Dureau's reference sheet.

She's a very tall, sturdy woman. She has a commanding presence and confident air, but she's really a soft mama. Although trained to fight (I forgot her rapier...) and versed in military tactics, she's more suited for diplomacy. She's also 33 yrs old (because I'm tired of seeing 18 yr old heroes.)

In Ascension, the world has been unified by the Church under the rule of the Patriarch. Dureau is one of the few Saviors, high ranking, elite officials answerable only to the Patriarch himself. They have a varied job. Mainly they travel all over the world to help people in whatever ways they can, offering their blessing, and it is said they can guide the souls of the dead to the afterlife. Sometimes they may be called in to fix disputes, or to fight against heretics that threaten the Church and it's teachings. More importantly, they are also responsible for scouting out children who have the potential to go undergo the Judgement in order to become the next wave of Saviors.

La Boheme

George Dureau in the French Quarter

Artist George Dureau at home and work in America's oldest Bohemia, the French Quarter, surrounded by his paintings, tableaux of juxtaposed objects and furniture, and his photographs.

George Dureau often takes photographs of naked men. He also draws and paints them. Naked dwarfs, naked amputees, naked African-American men. There is no middle ground with Dureau: His subjects are either physically deformed or perfectly constructed. Because the compositions are spare—if not stark—the viewer is forced to confront raw flesh, genitals, stumps. But Dureau’s views are empathetic, not voyeuristic. These nudes evoke the graceful contours of Greek sculpture, which lent immortality to the human form. Sexuality—whether gay or straight—is beside the point. Dureau’s work is explicit, like that of Mapplethorpe (who visited Dureau in the 1970s to study his technique), but he emphasizes the humanity of his models.

Dureau was born in 1930 and has lived in New Orleans his whole life. His oeuvre is not entirely relegated to provocative nudes: He also makes epic oil paintings with heroically rendered figures, which hang in the Ogden Museum of Art and elsewhere, and his bronze sculptures grace the gates of the New Orleans Museum of Art. He is represented by the Arthur Roger Gallery.

George Dureau: A Chance Meeting

Went walking a few block from the hotel we were staying in and ran into the most interesting fellow posted up in front of a painting in the doorway of his residence. After a bit of banter he gave us a tour of his house, a marvelous three story building in the French Quarter. Professional photographs, paintings, sketches and snapshots littered every surface. It soon became clear that he had to be an artist of some renown. After seeing several gallery postcards and artist showings, I googled him and was astonished. Even more so to see THIS ARTICLE in the New York Times soon afterwards.