Eugene Printz (1889 – 1948) was a French decorator and furniture designer he was born in Paris. Printz worked in his father’s workshop in the rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine in Paris, where he formed a staff of experimental practitioners. He used materials from the past in his modern furniture pieces, including forged iron, plated metals, and leather. He showed a preference for exotic woods, including sycamore, wild cherry, Rio rosewood, palissandre, and palm kekwood.
Biography
He set up his workshop at 12 rue Saint-Bernard in Paris, where he produced cabinets, rugs, drawings, and paintings. In 1930, he rendered the interior scheme of the boudoir of the Princesse de la Tour d’Auvergne in the Château de Grosbois, the private office of Jeanne Lanvin, the reception salon of Field Marshal Lyautey, and the arrangement of the Musée de la France d’Outre-Mer on the occasion of the 1931 Paris ‘Exposition Coloniale.
He became interested in lighting and wrote on the subject for the journal Lux in the 1930s. He felt that lighting should be considered at the very beginning of an interior-design project. Shown at the 1928 Salon, his couronne lumineuse (‘crown of light’) was widely imitated, including by architect Gabriel Guévrékian and lighting engineer André Salomon in 1929.
He opened his own gallery at 81 rue de Miromesnil in Paris. He designed offices, banks, press bureaux, and interior schemes in Britain, Belgium, the USA, and Mexico. Commissioned by Louis Jouvet, he designed sets for Domino and Jean de la Lune at Théâtre Athenée, Paris. On the eve of World War II, Printz, Dominique, Maurice ]allot, Jules Leleu, and René Prou formed the group Décor de France. After the war, his Eugene Printz furniture was produced in limited editions.
Exhibitions
He first showed his work in 1924; then regularly in the annual events of the Salon d’Automne and subsequently at the Salons of the Societe des Artistes Decorateurs. He made his international debut at the 1925 Paris ‘Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs et Industriels Modernes. A chandelier shown at the 1928 Salon d’Automne in grey metal was widely published. He designed one of the salons (the other by Jacques-Emile Ruhlmann) at the 1931 Paris ‘Exposition Coloniale · in the Musée des Colonies. At the 1937 Paris ‘Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne’, he and Étienne Kohlmann designed the general illumination of corridors and vestibules the Pavilion of Light; Printz showed a table jardiniere that could be lighted. At the same exposition, he worked on the pavilion of the Societe des Artistes Decorateurs.
Eugene Printz available in our partner stores
Source
Byars, M., & Riley, T. (2004). The design encyclopedia. Laurence King Publishing.