Jean-Claude Baudot is French. He was born in 1934. A father, grandfather, bibliophile, doctor, numismatist and philatelist. In short, Jean-Claude Baudot is genetically a collector. In the early 70's, he was already introduced to avant-garde art by two great collectors, Roland de Montaigu and René Ullmann. Psychedelism, arte povera, futurism, new realism, geometric abstraction, conceptual art ...
In 1980, the great French theorist of Copy Art, Christian RIGAL, offered him his book: The COPY ART (Edition Transform), with a dedication "why not your next collection?" Jean-Claude Baudot, who has already been
interested for two years to avant-garde postcards, (there are more than 20 000), accepted the challenge.
His fascination of THE PHOTOCOPIER, this new medium of creation, led the artists to hijack its original function of "copy". Their idea was to CREATE original and unique works. He visited the pioneering exhibition at the Pompidou Center in Paris from June 26 to September 30, 1980. He discovered the works of Pati HILL, an American artist living in Paris. He also discovered CEJAR (pseudonym of Christian RIGAL), Sol LEWITT and the minimalists, Gil WOLMAN and his "portraits of pockets", HUDINILSON Jr. and his erotico-corporal works ...
He was subjugated by the paradox of the photocopier. "Art Machina". A machine even faster than the camera, which had allowed, a few decades earlier, the blossoming of PHOTOGRAPHY, elevated to the rank of ART.
COPY ART, also known as XEROX ART, is instant, easy, fun, accessible, simple or complex, elaborate or unpredictable.
For art it's a revolution. Jean-Claude Baudot is dedicated to this emerging artistic movement. He collects and archives works, one by one, methodically. Objective: to create a museum. It brings together one of the most important private collections in the world. Perhaps the most important...1600 works, often major, sometimes masterpieces, by more than 400 artists.
In 2018, he had the idea to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the invention of the photocopier (1938). Many exhibitions and events are already scheduled in the USA, Canada, France, Italy, Germany, Spain etc .... "I chose Rio de Janeiro, he says, with the complicity of Alexandre Murucci, to present a selection of my best pieces 200 works by more than 100 artists This is the first time I exhibit my collection Thank you RIO and the Art Center Hélio Oiticica ".