Wonder at "fertility"
In this approach, the pregnant woman finds an essentially just place.
Through my wonder at the magic of gestation, there is an obvious place for the spontaneous appreciation of the developed forms of the pregnant woman, in this already sumptuous amplitude, in their primordial reality of life.
It is so good to exaggerate these volumes thanks to the excessiveness of the bodies sculpted in clay.
In fact, my current production is mainly dedicated as a hymn to femininity and fertility.
Besides, it is not impossible that artistic creation is a way for me to compensate for the frustration due to the limitations of my "male being". Indeed, it is a bit like granting it the capacity to let germinate in itself , in an improbable matrix, the seed of an embryo (artistic work?), and to give it a chance to be born of itself.
Artistic intention
- The fascination in front of “the woman”,
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Perhaps the natural fascination of the man by the woman was accentuated in my case by the fact that I had neither sister, nor female cousin in my family surroundings, and that I did not go around with girls, until late in my youth.The woman thus remains for me, still now, a mystery of an astonishing density.Attraction that I feel is always tinted with incomprehension which requests obligatorily a big amount of my imagination, especially when it is a question of making a representation of her .
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- The uncertainty and questioning about “the beauty”,
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After long phases of happy torpor in a standard comfort integrating all the certainties useful and necessary on the 'true beauty', unique and standardized, that it was advisable to adore, … it occurred that I ceased believing in it.I then felt myself like a prisoner.In particular, the standards of female beauty struck by our media and advertisement caused a problem to me.Regretting the vain damage which they caused in my own life, and deploring those which they do almost everywhere else as well as the dysfunctions that they often generate in the relations between the two sexes, I want to get rid of that straitjacket.That means, for me, the recognition of other forms of beauty, as well as possible beauty in other forms.During my work with living models, I am likely to meet and, sometimes, more and more often, to recognize the richness and the singular beauty which emanates from a really alive and expressive body.Then, mysteriously, it seems that its envelope and its morphology become adjusted like a miracle.It is the beauty of this very life, in its sincerity, its authenticity, its variety and its truth, which I like to try to insert in the clay, with an always renewed pleasure.
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- The amazement when I consider fecundity,
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In this approach, the pregnant woman finds a place primarily right.By the means of my amazement in front of the magic of gestation, there is an obvious place for the spontaneous appreciation of the developed shapes of the pregnant woman, in this already sumptuous amplitude, their paramount reality of life.It is so delightful to exaggerate these volumes, thanks to the right to disproportion of the bodies carved in the clay.My current production is mainly dedicated like an anthem to femininity and fecundity.In addition, it is not impossible that artistic creation is for me a means of compensating for frustration due to the limitations my “male being” - It is a little like granting the capacity to let germinate in oneself, in an improbable matrix, seed of an embryo (of artistic work?), and to give it a chance to be born from itself.
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- - the desire and urgency for the redevelopment of my own sensitivity,
- During my youth and previous professional life as an engineer, my artistic sensitivity has been severely choked.
I simply followed the path which was traced for me, in a well pepared way, passing by studious and a little long studies. I mainly did what one awaited from me.
Of course, that meant to put aside all that could be deviating or awkward, to smooth the individual singularities.
Moreover, my trade (initially in Nuclear Safety) required a lot of rigour, and I was rather proud of it at the time.Gradually, I distinguished failures in my realities. For example: I carried out my work, but I did not “live” it… I made, but I was not,… or so little.
I became convinced that it was necessary for me to give up my certainties and my comfort.
After a first period of “rebuilding”, I started to seriously plan to try “to find me again” on my personal way.I am currently in the course of this step of rediscovery and re-appropriation of my own sensitivity.
This is done by the means of artistic creation, at its own rhythm, without too much brusqueness.
With the difficulties that some will be able to imagine, I endeavour to disconnect a particularly long-lived and tough intellect, to abandon the ruts where I passed most of my former life, and especially to leave free course so that what I feel can be printed in the clay.
- During my youth and previous professional life as an engineer, my artistic sensitivity has been severely choked.
- The joy of letting myself been influenced by authentic affectivities,
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One does not easily get reed of several tens of years of assiduous and exclusive frequentation of the intellect, of cold and agreed objectivity of the sciences and techniques, especially when they were loved, with some sincerity.It is easier, to thwart the traps and logics of these idols, when you have the chance to be in contact with authentic individuals, who can as well be simple and rustic people or even accomplished artists.Then it becomes to be merry, though sometimes difficult and painful, and maybe risky, to authorize myself to let me be penetrated and carried by their influences.Thus, my work evolves to a less representative and realistic vision, leaving a freer place to the abstraction.This process is rather slow, I benefit from the influence of my surroudings, my neighbors, collegues and friends. I sigularly appreciate the kind pressure frome Claude Blanc-Brude (painter, artistic director of ACDA association), together with the the abunding example and the unreasonnable wisdom of Isabelle Peugnet (painter, friend and neighbor). The energy radiated from Anne-Cécile Allegre enlightens my way by the sparks escaped from her overflowing life.
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- The pleasure of expressing my “brutitude” freely,
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After years spent in another life “to let me be polished”, I taste a certain pleasure in freedom to allow my “brutitude” to express itself freely.This neologism, a little barbarian, however remains nearest to what I fell when I am authorized to use clay charged with crushed terra cotta, to translate the silky skin of the breasts of a pregnant woman.It might be possible that this freedom itself is supported by my home of life and work, so near to the “Facteur Cheval” and his “Rough Art”...
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- The desire to remain close to Nature,
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The spirit of “naturalness” and safeguarding of an authenticity remain in the center of my work and my current life.This is why my more or less rough sandstone grounds, remain naked or almost.They are fired with the gas flame of my kiln, at high temperature (around 1.300°C), generally in rather strong reduction atmosphere in order to reveal the character of the sandstone which touches me most directly.My sculptures are born in the very quiet and remote site of my workshop, in the middle of a surrounding natural area.
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- The love of nudity.
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Obviously in connection with my attachment to nature and to authenticity, nudity plays for me an essential role.Without extending on the various levels where it finds its place in my life, I like and I deeply respect nudity in my artistic work, for it's truth and his fundamental simplicity, for its disavowal of the overrated and the artifice.However, I do not find it always easy, nor even always pleasant to look at the naked human body.This is why I am delighted by the chance which is given to me to work most of the time with living models in movement. In those circumstances, the sight is purified and simplified by magic.My concern is simply to transfer something about the life and the movement of the model in the clay.I can be satisfied with my work only if one share of this spark of life is still in the completed sculpture.It is then ready to go live its own life, far from my workshop.
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