It all begins with an ending. That of my grandmother, Aliette NAVLET.
One heavy, muffled August, I set about sorting her last boxes.
It was then that, on orange graph paper, an elaborately drawn family tree emerged, carefully compiled by my great-grandfather in the 1970s.
I imagine him, bent over his large architect’s table, surrounded by erasers and pencils. The very same table where I traced my first letters.
With flawless precision, he recorded the Navlet names, first names, and dates; the figures that form our family.
The first names listed are the same that once signed the paintings adorning my grandmother’s bedroom walls not so long ago.
I only truly rediscovered these paintings during a sleepless summer night. “I was born with all of this; I can’t bear to look at it anymore,” my grandmother used to grumble.
Yet her emotion was palpable when she recognised L'escalier de l’Opéra de Paris (The Opera Staircase of Paris) by her beloved Victor, now exhibited at the Musée d’Orsay.
Victor, Joseph, Gustave, cousin Claire… Names that forged a family.
Temperaments above all! Though celebrated in their lifetimes, these minds, rebellious against the syrupy conventions of the 19th century, gradually faded from public memory.
And then there is Eugène, a civil engineer alongside Fulgence Bienvenüe; Arthur, who inspired Walt Disney; and Robert, at the EDF Engineering Department…
Today, by founding the Navlet Institute, my aim is to reintroduce the undeniable talent of the Navlet siblings and their descendants.
May their works, finally recognised, inspire today’s and tomorrow’s creators.
May their emotions, their history, and their era become a living testament.
Sharing their raw passion, funding restorations, digitising archives, collaborating on research: this is the mission of the Navlet Institute.
Lily J. N.