Philippe Dereux (1918 – 2001), The Hairdo With Birds, 1974

H. 61 cm – W. 41.5 cm – D. 4 cm (including mounting).
Collage of vegetable peelings on gouache-painted background in a glazed box frame.
Signed with the monogram lower right, dated and numbered “9” lower left.
Signed, titled, dated “January 1974,” and inscribed “Villeurbanne” on the back of the mounting.

A former schoolteacher in Lyon, Philippe Dereux devoted himself from the 1950s onward to a unique body of work based on the poetic transformation of everyday materials. A close friend of Jean Dubuffet, he took part in the Art Brut movement and developed his own visual language — that of the épluchures (“peelings”). These fragments of fruit and vegetable skins, dried and painted, became the elements of a playful yet profound vocabulary where humor, observation, and imagination converge.

In The Hairdo with Birds, executed in 1974, Dereux composes a frontal face whose hair transforms into a flock of organic shapes reminiscent of bird heads. The volumes, modeled from natural matter, merge with a gouache background in tones of violet and green, creating a lively dialogue between texture and color. The expression, both mischievous and uncanny, reflects the artist’s inventive spirit: a humanistic vision of nature, where waste becomes creation and fantasy turns into art.This work perfectly embodies Philippe Dereux’s experimental and poetic vein — a key figure of Lyon’s Art Brut movement and a creative companion to Dubuffet.