Interview
Interview by Laurence d'Ist for the exhibition "Signes Sensibles"
You paint vast territories, a mineral world dominated by
light, yet without any human presence. Is that right?
My approach is abstract in the sense that I find myself
absorbed by topographical questions. I work on the floor. I circle the canvas,
paying attention to the sedimentation of colors, the movement of ink across the
canvas, the direction, the structure, the density, the light and shadow, and
any obstacles. Even though in those moments I feel more like I’m digging than
covering, I practice a kind of navigation through an open space, closer to
geoglyphs than to caves.
On a trip to the southern United States, you’ll travel to
Arizona and New Mexico to discover the petroglyphs of Native Americans.
At the time, I knew them only from books… In these open-air
caves, the symbols speak to the cosmos. They aren’t very elaborate, but they
aren’t random either; they’re always placed in specific locations and seem to
convey meaning. But above all, they transcend time, and that gives me a sense
of vertigo. They make me dream; they stimulate me.
And yet, it is through the geometric structure of sheets
of paper pasted together that, in your large paintings from the early 1990s,
you approach a vocabulary of signs that seems to reach back to their origins?
It is difficult to move beyond the square, the cross, and
the circle, all of which can also be found in nature… In any case, once a
painting is finished, I realize that the effect evokes animal skin and rock. I
find myself thinking of prehistoric caves without consciously referring to them.
Then, one day, someone brought up “fanions” in front of my paintings. The ones
at Lascaux, which I had never seen or even known about! They consist of
geometric and rectangular forms placed side by side in a structured arrangement
and in ochre tones, just like my paintings!
For you, the cave has a modern dimension where no dogma
seems to exist between the abstract and the figurative.
If I identify too much, my interpretation becomes limited,
whereas abstraction seems to me to be a universal language. When I paint, I don’t
try to prevent an image, an animal, or a tree from emerging. The canvas is a
space of receptivity. Just as on the cave walls, where the animals seem to
float in space, harmless, as if protected in a safe place - a bit like Noah’s
Ark.
Words are often inadequate when it comes to describing
the creative process. Don’t you think that it’s the silences that best trace
the contours of the mystery contained in those moments?
Creation is a mirage we try to approach, touch, and feel,
without ever getting an answer. When I paint, I try to let go, to become an
antenna connected between sky and earth. Emptiness is primordial in painting to
bring that element of mystery to life. It is the white space that brings a
painting to life, allowing it to become inhabited.
And do you think that finding the right balance comes
through the language of the hand?
It is the channel through which visual and sensory
nourishment resurfaces. In my view, it possesses true autonomy. It reaches
realms that lie beyond thought. Emotion, memory, and feeling are conveyed
through the hand. The hand allows for a shared language, more universal than
spoken language, which requires us to share the same codes. Handprints,
perhaps, are more like self-portraits, since among the earliest human beings
there is no spontaneous representation of the human figure, whereas they have
no difficulty with abstraction or with creating elaborate signs.
In your paintings, you reconcile the desire to inscribe the
trace deeply while allowing the elements to transform freely.
It is fascinating to witness the work taking shape through
the patient transformation of iron and water, guided by the hand. One
inevitably thinks of shamanism, but I would say it is more a matter of
communication. After all, when we paint, we address others.
From the very beginning, you’ve been receptive to the
approach of the German visual artist and performer Joseph Beuys because he
imbues materials with a special meaning.
I appreciate the symbolic fluidity between the tool and its
use. Like the flute carved from a bird’s bone, which will mimic the bird’s
song. Or when the black charcoal used for drawing comes from the very animal
being depicted. This magical dimension fascinates me because, from the very
beginning, the creation is enriched with meaning, intensifying the sensations
evoked by the image tenfold.
How do you explain that painting appeals to the senses?
Creation is a transcendence, an all-consuming, total
preoccupation. And prehistoric cave art is proof of this. The relationship to
sound is already striking in these spaces; the caves that were chosen have
remarkably resonant qualities. Light also stimulates the eye, as flames create
particularly expressive shadows. And, finally, our deepest memories are
olfactory. I have a particular affinity for iron oxide. Rust that eats away at
the surface is more than just a technical consideration. Just like the wax that
envelops and heals. Their action is accompanied by a highly evocative smell. It
is a veritable time machine, taking us back to childhood, to that state of
being new and receptive.
You have a particular relationship with time.
That is the power of painting. When I look at a Velázquez,
his painting takes me back to him, to the vibration of the work, where I can
see him, alive. I have that same feeling when I stand before prehistoric cave
paintings, so inevitably, I travel through time.
Your abstraction can be read as a metaphor for the human
impulse to preserve, so as not to disappear.
I am drawn to Pliny the Elder’s account that painting was
born out of the desire to preserve. He tells of a young woman who drew the
outline of her beloved’s face on a wall, tracing the contours of his features
in the light, in an attempt to hold on to his image as he left to fight. In
this way, light reveals his image, while shadow becomes the work of absence.
For humankind knows all too well how to hasten its own
demise…
I experience history in fragments; a shock will intuitively
resurface in my paintings. Humanity’s history is punctuated by war. Iron is a
telling example. First discovered as a pigment, it became the medium for
sublime images that still speak to us, but was soon transformed into a weapon.
So, like human beings since the beginning, I see the course of our evolution as
remarkably linear. We move from progress to catastrophe, from destruction to
discovery. And so the prehistoric cave appears to me as extraordinarily
contemporary, while time itself feels immensely slow.
So, like the classical philosopher Plato, you believe
that humanity has still not emerged from the cave?
Let’s say that, irresistibly, we keep returning to it. When
we consider difficulties in understanding modern and contemporary art, one
might think that we have lost our sense of what art is, whereas in the
Paleolithic, signs carved thousands of years apart—sometimes as much as 5,000
years—could still be understood in relation to one another.
And yet, a deep current runs through the more recent
history of art. It seems that prehistoric signs are what sustain this
connection. Why do you think that is?
I have the feeling that we are at a pivotal moment in our
history. The extraordinary discoveries of science are leading us to become
something different. We are transforming ourselves through robotics and
genetics. Within a few decades, we will no longer be quite the Homo sapiens we
know today. So, could this be why there is a return to these primordial signs,
as though we were trying to remember the roots of our humanity? The cave, which
I think of as a kind of time capsule containing our history, intuitively
resonates with this profound transformation.
Laurence d’Ist, author
and exhibition curator.
