Mithé Espelt (1923 - 2020)

Born in 1923 in Lunel in the south of France, Mithé Espelt grew up in a family of winegrowers, close to a grandfather who transmitted her his taste for the arts and brought her into contact with major intellectuals and artists of the time.

Graduated from the Beaux-Arts in Montpellier in 1942, Mithé Espelt specialized in ceramics at the Fontcarrade school. She began by designing buttons for fashion houses in Paris, before managing the entire production of buttons and jewelry at the Lydia Chartier workshop and collaborating with Line Vautrin amongst others.

At the end of the war, she returned to her native south, opened her studio and took advantage of the growing effervescence around ceramics. To stand out and sustain the workshop business, she started designing gilded jewelry: a touch of luxury, the color work and their originality will make them successful.

Her art and her creativity will then be declined on many objects, very feminine, in a boudoir spirit: mirrors-jewelry, hand mirror, boxes ... This alchemist of the color brings all her sensitivity and the influence of her culture of south in her patterns (flowers, birds, branches) and her colors (pink, green, blue) and her themes (bulls, sun, pop art ...).

Mithé Espelt's works do not generally bear any signature. It is the artist's will, a militant act decided in 1952, by this humble and generous woman who liked to flee notoriety.

Inspired by "Mithé Espelt, le luxe discret du quotidien", Antoine Candau, Odyssee Editions, 2020.