You Too Can Live in the Visual World of Jean Cocteau

24 items inspired by the French artist’s work

You’ve seen the work of French artist Jean Cocteau on many a moodboard, I’m sure. Several of mine, probably!

Between 1909 and his death in 1963, the man made a truly impressive number of artworks: thousands of line drawings and sketches, hundreds of ceramics, more than 40 literary works, costumes and sets for at least a dozen major theater productions and ballets, and several murals and decorative commissions. He wrote poetry and plays, published six art books, and directed six feature films. Cocteau was known as the ultimate multi-hyphenate and a fixture of the avant-garde social scene, gallivanting with the likes of Picasso, Matisse, Dior, Proust, Saint Laurent, and Stravinsky.

Villefranche sur Mer—Chapelle St. Pierre (1957); Armoire at Santo Saspir (1950); Les Cyclades (1920, later edited in the 1980s by Artcurial); Poetry (1960); Poteries (1958); Working on the mural at Chapelle St. Pierre (1956)

There are a million biographies out there so I’ll skip the art history lesson, but in short, Jean Cocteau is regarded as one of the most influential artists of the twentieth century. I’d count myself among those influenced—the spirit of his work and his ability to bounce across mediums were obvious reference points for the branding Maddy and I did for Art Life Practice last year.

Cocteau’s “tattoos” on the walls of Santo Sospir, Cap Ferrat, France

In 1949, photographer Philippe Halsman shot a now-famous surrealist portrait of Cocteau with a few extra hands—one holding a pen, another a paintbrush, the others juggling a book, scissors, and a cigarette. According to historian Kenneth E. Silver, it was considered bad form to dabble across so many artistic lanes at the time; now we see it as range, but back then, it was dismissed as amateur hour behavior. Cocteau built an entire visual world—a personal brand, even—through his art, and it’s lived on through the many artists, designers, and writers his work influenced.

The Versatile Jean Cocteau, Philippe Halsman (1949)

I should note that Cocteau has a potentially problematic reputation beyond being a jack of all trades—he once wrote a piece praising the work of sculptor Arno Breker, who was a Nazi sympathizer, and received a lot of deserved criticism as a result. Cocteau claimed to have used his connection to Breker as a means to help his lover, Jean Marais, avoid Nazi persecution. (After being rejected by the French Resistance for being gay, Marais ended up on the Nazi death list for literally punching a right-wing critic.) Some suggest that Cocteau was a politically ignorant, opportunistic social climber; some say it was a gay man’s act of self-preservation. Either way, it’s worth acknowledging it all alongside his aesthetic influence.

That said, there’s no doubt that Cocteau’s fingerprints are left everywhere in today’s fashion, art, and design. I did a deep, deep, deep dive and came out the other side with an assortment of items that are very Cocteau-esque—some obviously, and some a little more abstractly. It also just so happened that this ended up feeling like a more shoppable sequel to the Room Recipe I wrote a few weeks ago about Cento Raw Bar, so if you liked that one, you’ll be into this, too.