The art of multitasking
Is it a hairdresser’s, is it a publishing house or is it an art gallery? Why, Salon d’Art is all three
Jean Marchetti is not a man who is content with simply letting things tick over. Three years after buying his first hairdressing salon in 1971, he decided to indulge his passion for art and use his salon as a gallery. “It started with me cutting the hair of different artists,” he says. Then a few years later, when moving down the road to his present location in Saint-Gilles, he set up Editions La Pierre d’Alun, the publishing house that he runs from the premises of Salon d’Art et de Coiffure, producing elegant limited editions that mix art and prose. “I wanted to create my own imaginary bookshelf,” he explains.
“I have been here almost thirty years now,” he says, recalling the days when Saint-Gilles was a bustling commercial centre. A fur dealer, a weaver and a printer all operated out of Marchetti’s premises on Rue de l’Hôtel des Monnaies before he moved in. But while he laments the area’s decline in the 1980s, his business vision is very much in keeping with the neighbourhood’s recent revival and gentrification. “I think I was proved right: if at first my [hairdressing] clients left because the gallery opened, now they come here because there is one.”
Although the current scope of his business wasn’t planned, the three elements that comprise Salon d’Art and Éditions La Pierre d’Alun appear to fit together quite well. “There are some artists who I exhibit, publish and cut their hair.” Artists such as Pierre Alechinsky, Kikie Crêvecoeur and Anne Desobry are regulars in Salon d’Art exhibitions and books. “In everything, I try to have real relationships, rather than occasional ones.” Marchetti says he is particularly excited about his latest exhibition, which opened on January 9, where for the first time he is showing Valérie Lenders, a mixed media artist whose canvases combine painting with stitching. Not that he prefers being a gallerist to a hairdresser or an editor. Asked which activity he enjoys the most, he replies: “It’s like asking which lung you use to breathe.”
Le Salon d’Art et de Coiffure
La Pierre d’Alun
81 Rue de l’Hôtel des Monnaies
1060 Brussels
Photo by Bart Wewaele
