There is no artwork available.

MONFLEUR Denis

Denis Monfleur is a contemporary French sculptor renowned for his bold, expressive work in stone.

His works, carved from raw materials such as granite and basalt, blend a primitive aesthetic with a striking modernity. Inspired by tribal art and archaic forms, he creates human figures and totems imbued with strength and simplicity. Each piece reflects a tension between the roughness of the material and the finesse of the lines, translating a quest for purity and timelessness.

Monfleur's approach is based on a dialogue between traditional craftsmanship and contemporary artistic vision. His sculptures, often monumental, evoke collective memory and universal myths.

Presented in prestigious venues and public collections, his creations question our link to the past while asserting a profoundly contemporary expression.

biographical details

Born December 14, 1962 in Périgueux, Dordogne. He spent his childhood in Paris, then in Nogent-sur-Marne. As a teenager, he took up clay modelling and, at 18, worked in the Paris press. He soon decided to devote himself entirely to sculpture.

Self-taught, Monfleur began by working in wood and marble. In 1986, he exhibited his work for the first time in Fontenay-sous-Bois. Three years later, he met Catalan sculptor José Subirà-Puig, who hired him as a practitioner. He also collaborated with Dietrich-Mohr and Marcel Van Thienen, experiences that marked his artistic development.

Since 1995, Monfleur has devoted himself mainly to granite sculpture, appreciating the stone's robustness and durability. His work is characterized by the technique of direct carving on hard, often monumental stones, where the human figure occupies a central place with a universal dimension.

In 2016, he was elevated to the rank of Chevalier in the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.

In few words

"I discovered hard stones by chance during my career.

I have a very pantheistic side and believe in the natural spirit of stone. It always fascinates me when I work on a basalt organ, an original element, a magma bubble that originated in volcanoes and rose to the surface 20 million years ago. It's very moving.
Stone is organic, it's not a dead material. "" Denis MONFLEUR

Denis MONFLEUR

"Monfleur speaks, he leaves traces of his thought, his involuntary, visceral thought, a thought of stone, of mute, stubborn gestures that persist in unfolding, in becoming more precise, as a people becomes more precise and redeploys itself in each child."

Éric VUILLARD

Selected solo exhibitions

2024
Hommes de lave et d'albâtre, Galerie Laurentin, Paris

2023
Peuples de pierre, Musée et Galerie des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux

Monumentales, Jardin et cour d'honneur de l'Hôtel de Ville, sur les parvis de la Galerie du musée et de la gare Bordeaux Saint-Jean.
Domaine de Chaumont-sur-Loire, arts and nature center, installation of 3 torsos

2022
Les Désaxés, Bagnoles de l'Orne, FDAC de l'Orne

2021
Selected by the Comité Vendôme for the installation of four monumental sculptures in Paris place Vendôme

2019
Grandeur Singulière. Exhibition in the town of Issoire

2018
Erratiques, Musée d'art sacré de Saint-Nicolas de Véroce

Parc Thermal et Maison forte de Hautetour, Saint-Gervais Mont-Blanc.
By the stone... Ad Petras, Musée Marcel Sahut, Volvic

2017
Individus VII, Espace collectivités, Parc des expositions, Le Bourget

2016
Pierres vives, Château de Montréal en Périgord

2015
Individus III, Musée du Cloître de Tulle
Realizes a work for the Musée International de sculptures contemporaines monumentales en plein air in Santo Tirso, Portugal

2014
Creation of a monumental sculpture in Uruguay entitled L'Atlante del Cerro, and exhibition in Cerro Timbó of thirty works created on site

2013
Monfleur Monumentales Metz, L'Art dans les Jardins, Metz

2012
Musée de la Fondation de Coubertin, Saint-Rémy-lès-Chevreuse

Public collections

- L'Apporteur de l'Espoir, parvis de la Gare d'Austerlitz, Paris
- L'Implorant, Fonds départemental d'art contemporain de l'Orne
- Ange blanc et Le Roi, Fonds municipal d'art contemporain de Yerres
- Creation of a sculpture for the International Brigades of Spain in collaboration with Oscar Niemeyer and Jean Michel Daquin, Musée de la Résistance, Champigny-sur-Marne
- Place de la Liberté-Hommage aux déportés juifs à Thessalonique, Thessalonique Museum of Contemporary Art
- Fonds municipal d'art contemporain de Villeparisis
- L'Observatoire, groupe scolaire Jean Zay, Fontenay-sous-Bois

- Le Torse noir, Etterbeck, on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the twinning of the towns of Fontenay-sous-Bois and Etterbeck (Belgium)
- Chambre de commerce et d'industrie versaillaise
- La Colonne ailée, Groupe Scolaire Jean Zay, Fontenay-sous-Bois
- La Grande Prière, Musée d'Art Contemporain, Saint-Ouen
- L'esclave ou le 20 décembre 1848, for the Centre d'Art Aimé Césaire, Ville de la Verrière
- Collection Jean-Claude Volot, Abbaye Auberive

Artists to
discover