ABSTRACT
The resonance of the images produced in the occupied workshops at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, the Ecole des Arts Decoratifs and elsewhere is often attributed to a spontaneous eruption of graphic imagination, this chapter argues that many of the most significant posters drew on contemporary debates surrounding the politics of the image in Pop art, Figuration Narrative and other artistic practices. Many commentators attributed the political retrenchment in the wake of the events to a “failed encounter” between workers and students, one that was ordained when the supposedly anti-capitalist labor unions locked workers in their occupied factories in order to shield them from student radicals and their ideas. In 1965 Gilles Aillaud, Eduardo Arroyo, Antonio Recalcati and others assumed control of the organizing committee of Jeune Peinture and brought its political undercurrents to the surface. The catalog provided opportunity for the exhibited artists to articulate their vision of artistic engagement at the threshold of cultural and political contestation.
