Jean-Michel Coulon (1920–2014) was a French painter from the School of Paris who had the particularity of having kept his work – over 600 paintings – almost secret over his artistic lifetime.

Being well introduced in the artistic movement of the 1940s and 50s, he was acquainted with Nicolas de Staël, Serge Poliakoff, André Lanskoy, Maria Helena Vieira da Silva, met Picasso, in particular with his brother in law Olivier Debré.

He undertook numerous visits to Germany, where he quickly became fluent, and to Italy after high school with his friend and future brother-in-law Olivier Debré He traveled on cargo ships along the Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts of Africa, on which he managed to board without paying any fees.

In 1943, the Vichy regime introduced the compulsory work service so he decided to leave Paris and obtained a false identity card.

In 1949 he met his future wife, Caroline Garabedian, an American violinist studying at the Paris Conservatory.

He exhibited at the Jeanne Bucher gallery, in Paris with Georges Braque, Pablo Picasso, Paul Klee, Jean Lurçat, Jean-Paul Laurens, Nicolas de Staël, André Lanskoy, Maria Helena Vieira da Silva, Hans Reichel, André Bauchant, Alfred Manessier, Árpád Szenes and Vassily Kandinsky.

In 1952, his other younger brother, Jean-François – a 25-year-old officer in the French Air Force – crashed in a plane during a mission in Tunisia.

He took the car alone, sometimes, and left to explore some European countries, spending the night with local inhabitants, asking people to open very confidential illuminated archives or drawings kept out of the light.

His spirit remaining intelligent and lively up to the end, he was working to the very last days, still with warm and bright colors.

Due to its recent discovery and the absence of comments left by the artist, the overall vision of Coulon's work is being considered and subject to discussion.

The main points of reflection concern in particular: The art historian Lydia Harambourg proposed some answers in a first monograph of Coulon published in June 2018.