It is only in the silence of my studio that my creation can take shape. Everyday functional ware that hold in the hand. Silent and message-transmitting statuettes. Porcelain ware or stoneware, sober, unique and sleek; discreet and poetic. Decorations of trees, colors in simple touches, photographic transfers. Nothing noisy. A small sketch done vaguely in a small circle notebook after a short night.
But behind this discretion lies the rigor of the scientist. I note, I explore, I weigh, I test. Always looking for new recipes of clay, slip, oxides, glaze. A chemist’s past that pursues me. As a child, I was constantly mixing colors of chalk powder with water in small bottles and played hours to find the perfect match. I now realize that my experiments are not far from this juvenile habit.
After the rigor of the calculation, it is the rigor of the gesture. Porcelain throwing requires patience and concentration. Miles of practice so that at the end as the spinning dervish, the gesture becomes hypnosis. I love the demand of this clay beyond its softness. You must have an eye on it constantly, incubate it and determine the precise moment to shape, bring back, fix or turn.
And recently, I was again interested in casting. A casting table has been waiting in my studio for about ten years. After a training with my former teacher, I went back to making plaster molds. I was so glad to make such thin ware.
It's not finished. Remains the determining part of the decoration. I have always liked sleek lines where only the stroke as the gesture fills the space like Japanese prints. That’s why I opted for a simple brush color line like a calligrapher posed against a simple drawing decal.
After a very slow drying, the important part of firing. Organ point where everything is concentrated. The defects as well as the qualities are enhanced, magnified by the glaze that will envelop the whole with its satin, its softness and its brilliance.
For some, it is like a pagan celebration where everyone dances around the fire. For me, it is above all the solitary waiting in front of a hermetically sealed kiln waiting until the temperature drops to dare to open without breaking. I’m trying in vain to do something else, to forget the kiln. Nothing does, I keep coming back, trampling in front, opening and finally discovering… the fruits of my labour.
Seven collection with drawing patterns
These 7 collections are all drawn or taken from original photos. Each collection has its own history. The first to emerge is the Plum tree Collection from a photographic work. I have always had a camera that accompanies me in my travels. I compile photos of memories, details, foliage according to my obsession of the moment. I call it matter in becoming. And then it comes out, you don’t know how, but at the right time. I continued this work with drawings of insects. I find the wings of the dragonfly fantastic, very graphic. For The walkers, these are small, quick graphic sketches that you do when you’re on the phone that inspired me and took me into a whole bunch of little stories, memories. For Cats, it was the idea to take breaks as only cats can take in their long moments of relaxation.
And also, the exotic, coming from a distant continent, Australia. The traveling has always been a founding part of my life. My parents traveled a lot and I only returned to France at the age of 10 to leave 2 to 3 months every year in Asia until I was 25. These trips fed and truly constituted me. In Australia, I was a bit confusing. It is a country both near and far. The way of life is very similar to ours except that instead of deer in the countryside you have kangaroos, instead of sparrows in the cities, you have parrots! It’s very intriguing. It’s as if your glasses had failed to set the record straight. It is by seeing these signs indicating the presence of kangaroos that I had the desire to implement this collection by mixing our deer or the Australian pedestrian crossing.
And since then, two lock-downs have passed by. Hence my collection Daisy in homage to this particular spring and the collection Envol born after a stroll by the sea just before the 2nd confinement history to take a big breath of air!
Ten colors
I recently expanded my color range from six to ten. I had to choose and I took them all. These colors are the result of a long work of weighing, firing, making choice. These are times where we must take the time. Every color resonates. Yellow mustard, for example, was the color of the first clay I throwned in my own studio. I was still depending on the Icf (Institut de Céramique Française) in a studio rented year-round and with the teachers wiling. A dream. At that time I used to throw mustard-colored earthenware. I loved its color when it was still a little raw, not quite dry, leather as we say. It could take the light in a wonderful way. When I was able to do that mustard color again, I was thrilled.
Loving colors, I even developed this Berlingot collection consisting of a camayeu of color in red or blue tones laid out in the form of lines or freely calligraphed. The Traces collection is also in this vein. I like the idea of gesture in the way of the painter Soulage.
