Another City for Another Life

What pieces or projects have you been working on lately?
I am currently working on collages. I bought a small notebook and set myself the goal of filling it quickly. I mostly depict animals: I am fascinated by their variety of shapes and colors. It’s an inexhaustible subject for me.

I also like to represent them in a slightly distorted way, aiming for the strange. I try to mix techniques and textures (papers of different qualities, monotype, Indian ink, washes) to create strong contrasts and visual play. Above all, I seek a raw expressive power, a graphic strength: shapes and colors that catch the eye in just a few seconds.

What did you learn (or unlearn) while working on them?
Before this, I mostly worked in black and white, using Indian ink. I felt like I was going in circles. This work allowed me to create colorful worlds and atmospheres. By varying techniques, I also learned to work with surfaces and textures, whereas before I almost exclusively focused on line. I always try to preserve the vibrancy of the line, because that’s what I love, but through cutting and collage, I approach it differently.

What words, ideas or emotions were going through your head?
Art has its own language. I never work from words. The words of art are shapes, colors, textures, rhythms — things that, in my view, cannot be transmitted through language. The same goes for ideas. I don’t have a conceptual approach to art. Almost provocatively, I would say I have no ideas. In reality, I try not to have any. I would like to simply make an image randomly, throwing pieces of paper onto a blank sheet.

I also wouldn’t say that I work from emotions, but rather from sensations. I try to create atmospheres so that those who see my work feel something physical. That’s what great artists’ works do to me, so I try to achieve the same effect!

Were there any conversations, movies, music, or books that made their way into that work?
Of course! A film: The Night of the Hunter by Charles Laughton. A piece of music: Music for Children from Prokófiev, which inspires me with colors and arrangements of shapes. A book: the excellent work by labor sociologist Juan Sebastián Carbonell, Augmented Taylorism. It is a book that critiques AI and shows concretely the effects of its deployment in the workplace.

It reinforced an idea I already had: going against the smooth, standardized aesthetic that AI can easily replicate, developing a raw aesthetic, playing with accidents, making gestures and handwork visible. I think people are rightly wary of AI, and standing out with this approach — not striving for a perfectly smooth and finished style — can meet a simple need in the audience: to interact with a human rather than a machine.

What's been the most difficult thing you've faced recently in your creative process?
Lack of space.

What is your favorite restaurant and what do you recommend we order?
The Argentine restaurant Onoto, in Paris. The only place in Paris that makes milanesas!

If your life were a movie this month, what would it be called and who would write the soundtrack?
Another City for Another Life. RZA would create the soundtrack.

Which studios, laboratories, or workshops have you collaborated with recently or would you like to collaborate with in the future?
I have projects in children’s literature, but nothing has been realized yet, so I can’t say more for the moment.

Recommend one or more artists you follow who inspire you, and tell us what you like most about their work or their way of working.
One of the most important artists for me is Jean Arp. The fact that he was both a poet and a visual artist inspires me greatly. I love artists who go beyond their specialization. The spontaneity of his visual works, their simplicity, and the way he lets chance play a role inspire me a lot. When I don’t know what to do, I look at Jean Arp, and ideas for shapes very often come to me.