Painting, Screen-Printing Work 2005-2007

‘Big M‘, ‘Paradise never found‘,’little guests in the sun Palace‘,’old fashion in the sky ‘:
That work is based on an idea of nostalgia, unacomplished or illusional dreams. The symbols of the brands are presented in a discontinuous and floating repetition, and the whole composition is treated in an extreme flatness, echoing the superficial constistency of brands and advertising. The big M floating in the background composes the main architecture of the piece, standing as an iconic ideal.either religious or dictatorial, It forms two arches floating in the sky background, as pillars of a church or gates for Paradise. The main colours are pale and fading, as in old photographs, reflecting the idea of nostalgia by taking out the ‘life‘ and consistency of the setting. Bright colours and lively treatment of paint are used to represent the small bits of « nature » present in the picture (the hearts and the lanscapes apertures) increasing the contrast in between dream and reality, the ambiguous relationship between the symbol and what is behind it: sometimes=nothing.

The choice of several boards reenforces the symetry of the piece, imitating industrial decomposition (as posters in the streets made of several pieces put together to form a whole), if one piece is taken appart, the M is deconstructed and everything looses meaning: the consistency is a fragile set up made of discontinuous elements. The composition inspiration lies in between advertisments, dictatorial propaganda and japanese cartoons: it uses an attractive and simple language of symbols (hearts, pure sky, iconic brands,…as propaganda uses recurrent themes of manipulation,simple graphism, and fixedness of postures), an exageration and breaking of scale (as in advertizing and politic posters), and cinematographic point of view (contre-plongee used to reenforce the impact). The piece reflects a mix in between irony and nostalgy, tackiness and preciousness, in between innocence and the loss of innocence (child/adult), simple things and manipulation.

‘no hero versus dominus octopus ?‘:
This work uses the expression of a 2 dimentional language made of symbols and repetition. I was inspired by simple, old fashion video games, where the characters and actions are simple and repetitive (an animal has to catch apples or something) ex: the game ‘snake‘ in mobile phones.It echoes the discontinuous and repetitive language of media and digital images. The representation of the character is very basic: simple form and recognizable colour. The mean character is a monster (here it is an octopus, symbol of hell), apples are food for energy, kees are the tresure to catch. The repetition of the floating elements create a visual impact, as when you played to much to a game, you close your eyes and you can still see the actions and characters obsessively moving in your head. It gives an impression of schyzophrenic vision. The repeated smiles with golden teeth add an ironical dimention: they reflect the media manipulation (fake smiles, discontinuous elements, use of glamour to sell,…) tending to kitch. The piece is also marked by the presence of good and evil, echoing the children simple vision of life (through tales, stories,adult explanations). The background is independent of the repeated screen-print on each board, that gives two levels of reading: one is painted, recognizibly handamade, naive and plain; on the other hand, the second layer is a repetition of a screen-printed digital pattern, made of separated elements floating. The whole reflects a child world (the background is like a child drawing, the brown colour reminds chocolate bars, the characters are cartoony), comfortable, happy and naive, but tinted of desilusionnal irony.

Influent artists and inspiration:
Japanese contemporary painting :the art of Flatness (Nara: angry teenage, Takashi Murakami: flat characters,pop colours), Folk art (Lili Van der Stocker: child world, naive,symbolic), Christopher Wool (repeated patterns, instinctive screen-printing), Jerome Bosh (monsters invading,symbolism of hell), Communist propaganda art (Mao Posters), Cartoons, Comics and Video Games, advertisments, Chris Ofili (for the formal approach: use of fake jewels and dimentional paint in some parts of the work: adding ‘kitch’, a sensitive approach to the materiality of paint, tactile impressions, and decorative references)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Graffiti is something I was introduced to by the graffiti artist NET in 2004. I was experimenting portraits with spray paint when he was doing the lettering. It was a very nice experience playing with a new technique.

In 2007, as a small project I started to make stencils of portraits of my friends in London with black spray paint. This work is more personal and echoing my life in London. With some stencils I chose to blend the portraits to create mixed features and strange characters raising from the union of two identities. I also chose to select just the eyes to create a pattern of different looks that I then put as a pattern for a teeshirt front.

And it Was Good… (digitally modified engravings)

“Collage is something like the alchemy of the visual image; the miracle of the total transfiguration of beings and objects with or without modification of their physical or anatomical aspects (…). Collage is an alchemical composition of two or several heterogeneous elements resulting in their unexpected union, due to a will tending_by love of clairvoyance_ toward the systematic confusion and “derangement of all senses” (Rimbaud), either by chance, or a will of favouring chance.”
Max Ernst, Beyond Painting

This work started with a fascination I have old engravings books that I found. I started mixing and transforming images from those books on computer, in a will of disturbing the situations and the features in order to create ambiguous and mysterious scenes, an uncanny feeling. As my process of work was mainly instinctive and linked to unconscious, the result is in a way very surrealistic, and using the same basis as surrealist (the unconscious, Freudian themes, the magical, the alchemical, the occult), to recreate psychological processes translated into symbols, through recurrent themes referring to a subliminal and atemporal unconscious.

The use of ‘Victorian’ sources refer to a mental past, and this past imagery echoes in a way the personal introversion toward a subliminal memory, a route to the unknown.

In an ‘Alchemical Glossary’ (in the end of “Max Ernst and Alchemy” by M.E Warlick), I found several themes and symbols that can be found in my work:

Black and White are 2 of the 3 major phases of alchemical transmutation connected to those colours (destruction/ purification)

Animals refer to materials, phases, and operation of the work. 2 animals of different sexes represent the masculine and feminine archetypes.

Serpent is the symbol of Earth, Primal Matter and its fixity+ libido and phallus

Lion is a traditional male symbol for the earth and Primal Matter. Killing of a Lion= destruction of Primal Matter.

Birds are symbol of the psychological traumas/ sexual intercourse

Crow refers to the color Black. Phase of blackness, putrefaction.

Eagle is the Feminine aspect of Primal Matter, volatile nature of the material.

Wings are volatile nature of the material, a volatile phase

Circle or sphere are a unity of matter

Primal matter is a base matter containing everything necessary for the completion of the work, a substance connected to the earth that must be found before the work can begin; chaos. The mythic ‘killing’ of Primal Matter relates to psychological battles, which entail the “disclaiming of all bonds and limitations that the soul has carried over from childhood into adulthood” (Silberer). Putrefied Body. Once the alchemical killing and the psychological stage of introversion are completed, purification and regeneration can begin. “The decaying which precedes the arising of the new being is connected with a great inundation” (Silberer).

Putrefaction is destruction, killing of Primal Matter to bring out all of its impurities, resulting in the blackening phase.

Water is one of the 4 basic elements of matter, known for its cool, moist, and fluid properties. It is connected to the process of purification. Introversion (sinking into ones soul) is symbolised by the submarine, which is capable of plunging into the depths.
And it Was Good…
(digitally modified engravings)

Whatever, (Ice Cream Memory) (Toys Project)

My inspiration for this work comes from an idea of nostalgia about childhood, and a presentation of a collection. I collected different types of second hand toys from different places. Some are from my childhood, some are found, all the little plastic ones belonged to a little girl who sold them on Bricklane market, and the older ones I found in different markets in London and Germany.

They all belong to different memories and different times. This collection is a bit of a constructed memory, a kind of an absurd display, referring kitsch and the mass-produced object, but also mixed with something more unique and beautiful that embodies a more “authentic” toy. Some are broken, slightly transformed or weird, creating ‘tension’ between what is supposed to be a cute object, and something more scary emanating from the transformation, the stillness, or the fact that it is broken.

Détail of Whatever (Ice Cream Memory)

I added plaster on the wooden structure, giving an impression of a fake snow in a kind of chalet decor style, suggestive kitsch postcards. The snow also looks like an ice cream, as it was applied to the wood in the same way as icing a cake. I like this idea of Christmas feeling, all be it a plastic one.

I like the different attitudes represented by the toys: they are all standing still in a mood, most of them with happy faces, very cliché. Some of them are angry, some look bored, and others are very roughly made so they look scary instead of being cute.
I didn’t really play or create many stories between them, and I just lined them up like a trophee, a collection. On the wall, above some of them, I fixed some handmade resin tears and painted dry flowers from a pot-pourri.

This work is also about the difficulty of working: I put the toys on a stretcher, so they are like a compromise of a painting. Toys also represent the fun and play instead of work.

The snow freezes the toys in a particular time, as stuff one puts in the freezer to preserve it as long as possible. Repetition and the process of collection are also referring to a refusal of change, time passing and death, and a need of possessing to fill a void. Overall, this work is situated between nostalgia and a kind of irony, mixing the authentic and the plastic, toys and wood, plaster and fake snow spray, handmade and mass produced…creating an ambiguity between the authentic and the made up, memory, absurdity, and kitsch.

23 Donkey ears prototypes

The starting point of Donkey ears project is in a scene of Luigi Comencini’s Pinocchio (1971), when Pinocchio and his friend miss a day of school after following some gypsies who seduce them to a fairground, a “paradise for kids” with roundabouts, candies and drinks all night…They then wake up with donkey ears. Pinocchio first sees his friend’s donkey ears, and they both look at each other without noticing their own ears. All the other kids are doing the same, pointing at each other and laughing. Then, Pinocchio sees himself in a puddle, and realises the transformation…

This film, particularly this scene, which shows his transformation into a donkey, was very striking to me when I was a child. I remember this film very clearly, because at the time I felt that this was quite a grown-up film for children…It was scary and appealing at the same time.

By recreating and reinterpreting the donkey ears, I was interested in recontextualising the transformation as an animal. I wanted to play between the comic and the theatrical, to convey a sense of ‘mental torture’.

Through the process of making the hats, I started using screws and different shapes and pieces of metal, which make the ears look ‘dangerous’ (a bit like torture instruments from the middle ages…). The use of the fur ads to the bizarreness and uneasiness of the object, and when I added them to the metal structure, I realized that they seemed a bit like fetish toys. This idea makes the work a bit disturbing to approach.

When worn, these hats become much more theatrical and humorous, and I really like their surrealistic aspect; as they are a bit absurd and ridiculous. They are meant to be worn by people during the exhibition, creating a kind of ‘donkeys community’ wandering in the show and sometimes passing each other, sometimes being alone. I also like the idea of being a donkey in the art world (like a kid who has to wear a donkey hat in the corner of the classroom because of his misbehaviour)_not very much in a sad and negative way, but more in an ironic and comic way.
I wanted to express a difficulty of communication between contemporary art and viewers. I guess that the one who wears the donkey ears during the show is a bit of an outsider, not very much understanding what is happening but still part of this world, and part of the work. It is also an encounter with other people’s work, either in a interrogative or fascinated way.

Donkey ears are symbol of stubbornness and shame. (In Greek mythology, King Midas had his ears transformed as those of a donkey by Apollo. He then hides his ears and nobody knows the secret apart from his hairdresser, who once betrays him and shouts it to the whole city). Donkey ears are a symbol of shame because they are disproportionate, a bit funny, they are deserve to be hidden. Who wants to be the ass of the story? (but donkeys are also in fact symbols of many contrasting things).

What I feel that I like in this project is the fact that it is open to different interpretations; and this is what makes it interesting to me. I feel that it is a bit complex and problematic, because it is a shifting-meaning object, with a possibility to create different effects, even the most contrasting ones.

I really enjoyed the process of making a theatrical outfit, the mix of materials, the endless possibilities of making something surrealistic and symbolic. In the end, this work has a clumsy look,  like very handmade prototypes, but I like its playfulness, its fun, and its open field.