Master of Art Brut, Michel Nedjar was born in 1947 in the Val d'Oise to a Jewish family marked by war and the holocaust. His father, born in Algiers, settled in Paris in 1921 as a tailor. At home, he tinkered on a sewing machine doll clothes for his sisters. During the Second World War, a large part of his family fell victim to Nazi oppression. In 1960, he became aware of the magnitude of the Holocaust. At the age of fourteen, he enrolled in a vocational school to become a tailor and sells jeans with his flea grandfather from Saint-Ouen and accompanies his grandmother to the scrap fair; she makes him share his love for Shmattès (the worn cloth) that she picks up and stacks. In the spring of 1967, he left for military service. With tuberculosis and declared disabled in 1968, he spent a few months in a school of fashion stylist. He is upset by the vision of 'Night and Fog' by Alain Resnais, echoing his own disappearances in his family. In the years 1970-1975, he left with Teo Hernandez. His travels take him to Morocco, Asia Minor, Europe and Mexico. He discovers cultures rich in symbolic expressions. He begins to take an interest in the funeral art and the dolls whose magic function fascinates him. Returning to Paris in 1976, he began making his first dolls called "Chairdâmes" with rags that he gleaned in the neighborhood of the Goutte d'Or, then made dolls dyed. In 1978, a period of depression transformed his style: his dolls look like gargoyles and terrifying totems, they are sometimes soiled with dirt and even blood. It was in 1980 that he began to draw with grease pencils on recovered flea media. He made his first films in 8 mm from 1964 during his holidays in Greece or the Balearic Islands. Like Lionel Soukaz, he is one of the first French experimental filmmakers to address the theme of homosexuality (Le gant de l'autre, 1977). His practice will evolve towards a more formal exploration of the characteristics of cinema: luminous calligraphies (Gestuel, 1978), grain of the film (Le grain de la peau, 1986); either to direct cinema (Monsieur Loulou, 1980). These research finds their paroxysm in Capitale-paysage (1982-83), mixing snatches of conversations, work of concrete sound and rhythm, and kaleidoscopic effects.

Filmography

• 2020Crime contre le cinéma
• 2003Black Room Revealed — Director
• 2003Black room révélée — Director, Writer
• 2001Bouche D'Oeil — Director
• 1991Madrid, Quelques Images
• 1990Plus Venise — Director
• 1989Le chant de l'âme
• 1987Fragments
• 1986Le grain de la peau / Streap tease — Director
• 1986Robillard André, Nedjar Michel
• 1985Chantilly/Sarah (journal septembre 85) — Director
• 1985Journal de Michel Nedjar (août 85) — Director
• 1985Une journée avec Pascal Martin et André Robillard — Director
• 1985Une journée avec les Cantrill — Director
• 1984Chutes de Lacrima Christi — Performer
• 1984Portraits / Mirrors
• 19834 à 4 Métro-Barbès-Rochechou-Art — Director
• 1983Bouquet of Eyes — Director
• 1983Capitale-paysage — Director
• 1983Chutes de 4 à 4 Métro-Barbès-Rochechou-Art — Director
• 1983Diaph limite 1,2 Posture d'exil — Director
• 1983Signaux lumineux pour un ballet nuptial — Director
• 1982Chutes de Capitale-paysage — Director
• 1982À quoi rêve l'araignée ? — Director
• 1981Monsieur Loulou — Director
• 1981Sara
• 1981Sur Graal de T.H. — Director
• 1980Chutes de Ombres-ailes — Director
• 1980Graal
• 1980Journal à durée indéterminée — Director
• 1980Lacrima Christi
• 1980Le grain de la peau — Director
• 1980Ombres-ailes — Director
• 1980Sara/Teo — Director
• 1979Ailes — Director
• 1979Chutes de Hors-jeu — Director
• 1979Hors-jeu — Director
• 1978Angle — Director
• 1978Cinématon — N°27
• 1978Cinématon III — N°27
• 1978Cinématon n°27 : Michel Nedjar
• 1978Cristaux
• 1978Gestuel — Director
• 1978Teo — Director
• 1977Cristo — Production Assistant
• 1977Désir — Director
• 1977Esmeralda
• 1977La tasse — Director
• 1977Le gant de l'autre — Director
• 1977Malik — Director
• 1976Salomé
• 1970Michel Over There
• 1970Pause

Appearances as themselves (7)

• 2016Dolls of Darkness: The Art of Michel Nedjar — Self
• 1984Chutes de Michel Nedjar — Himself
• 1984Mesures de miel et de lait sauvage — Self
• 1983Souvenirs/Rouen — Himself
• 1981Chutes de Pascal — Himself
• 1978J'aime — Himself
• 1978Michel Nedjar — Self