Seguy insects

E a seguy art
Eugène Séguy was a French entomologist and artist who specialised in Diptera.
Émile-Alain Seguy was born in France in 1877 and studied at the School of Decorative Arts in Paris.

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E.A. Seguy, Insects, and the Art of Pochoir

E.A. Seguy was an artist and designer active in Paris during the first three decades of the 20^th century. Very little is known about him, even his actual name and birth/death dates are in dispute. During my search for more information, I even stumbled across an odd theory that blames the confusion on the presence of not one but two E.A. Seguy’s living and working in Paris during this time period. Regardless of the mystery and speculation surrounding his life, what we do know about Seguy can be found in the design folios he left behind.

Seguy produced eleven albums of nature themed illustrations and patterns, drawing inspiration from papillons and other insects, flowers, foliage, crystals and animals. Seguy was one of few artists that successfully combined both Art Deco and Art Nouveau styles in his work. His brightly colored geometric patterns were intended to be used as inspiration for such decorative items as textiles and wallpaper.

Dover Publications reproduced Seguy’s albums in a book entitled Seguy’s Decorative Butterfli

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Georges Séguy

French trade unionist (1927–2016)

Georges Séguy (16 March 1927 – 13 August 2016) was a French trade union leader.

Biography

Born in Toulouse, Séguy's father was a communist and trade unionist, and Pierre Semard was a family friend. In 1940, Séguy joined the illegal Communist Youth. After Semard was executed in 1942, Séguy became more involved in the resistance, keeping watch while the movement was sabotaging the railways. He found work at Henri Lion's printing works, which served the resistance, and he soon became its main contact with the underground French Communist Party (PCF), General Confederation of Labour (CGT) and National Front.^[1]^[2]^[3]

In 1944, the printing works was betrayed, and all the staff were arrested. Under torture, Lion refused to give evidence against Séguy, probably saving his life, but Séguy was sent to the Mauthausen concentration camp. While at the camp, he pretended to have skill in metalworking, and was assigned to the aviation workshop, where he undertook various acts of sabotage. He al

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The Other Life of Eugène Séguy, Entomologist

*Guest post by Julie Gibbons. All images via North Carolina State University Libraries.

This is the fourth in a series of posts on famous people who did surface design as a sideline to their main jobs. Often, they were so famous that their main job completely eclipsed their pattern-making skills, and it can be hard to find out information about this aspect of their work. I present to you the entomologist, Eugène Séguy.

Eugène Alain Séguy is quite a mysterious figure in early 20thC Europe, with little information available on him. Some sources suggest there were two folk with the same name – one an entomologist, responsible for founding the Diptera section in the Museum National d’Histoire Naturelle in Paris, and the other a surface designer, whose numerous patterns included a substantial number based on insects.

However I do believe he was just one man, based on these truly stunning, scientifically accurate images of insects, provided in a portfolio of works alongside patterns. They are made using the pochoir technique, a type