All is risk

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    If I were to try to identify the ins and outs of my work as a painter, I would begin by saying that I was never seeking coherence in the first place. The experiences reflected in the  paintings and drawings are undoubtedly varied, as I never intended to avoid or flee the challenges my mind faced. A painter must say to himself “Dare and see”. I like the idea of an interior multiplicity, the idea of a journey along various axis of our inner dimensions. We are all made of intertwined worlds, and my paintings are generally made of bits and pieces. I claim not to think the individual as a narrow or superficial unit, and it won’t be hard, when looking at the pictures on this website, to notice this inner diversity. 

    Thus, no repetitive patterns, but of course there are basso continuo parts. How can one paint without being haunted by certain things ? I believe a few dramatic obsessions, arising from deep down inside me, bounce from canvas to canvas, though it isn’t the painter’s role to discuss them. In this respect, there is nothing I can say. This is why the spectator needs time to fathom for himself the operating forces and their constant confrontation. I always seek for the most interactions to exist between the drama of these tensions, which are the fundamental dynamic of artistic painting, and the foundation of each piece. What would be the point of an artwork if it didn’t embrace in its frame all problems in life?

   

   As for the human representation, which my work focuses on in great measure, I believe a painting should create a link between imagery and narration. It is one of this work’s proposals, and I disagree with the idea  of removing this dimension from Painting. In this matter, however, I don’t believe the painter should express himself publicly either. Thus, my silence rests, except mentioning this “Nothing of mystery” as the poet would say. I distrust painters with theories, or those who want to directly politicize their work. I simply feel that unless life manifests itself, nothing can begin.

    Colours also interest me, as it is an infinite world. I feel that they carry true passion, the world’s anthem, even the tragical aspects. Harshness does not prevent nuances. The sensuality of painting is here at stake. It has been widely undermined for the past decade, but, it appears to me, contrary to this prudeness of tastes, necessary : I claim to take the way of sensitivity, our common humanity. 

 

    I have always worked slowly, as is only human. I am hung on how many months or years are necessary to reach the desired result, sometimes it takes 10 years to escape the traps of a painting. On every level, in art, time does not exist. Modestly, I believe our era could better appreciate this inner time and perceive time in the long run, as being the only horizon for our actions. This doesn't mean it has no influence on the way the spectator perceives the artwork:  may he travel freely through the canvas where events are a direct result of this time flow, a stratigraphical journey. The immediacy of a painting, so important, and for which the artist so fiercely battles, goes hand in hand with an invitation to slowly contemplate. I will never distance myself from the teachings passed on over the centuries: painters teach us how to observe. As evidenced by the many languages pervading every artwork, nothing of what I say prevents the outside world from knocking on the door ! All these languages, as a Babel tower for your eyes.

 

    We know painting to be immemorial. How could the small crisis of the end of the 20th Century threaten its existence ? Maybe because Painting runs through your veins exhibiting a body’s vitality, because it has a particular way of revealing things, I love it for its telluric wrestling dimension, creating a direct connexion between the hand’s life and the painting’s thoughts. At a time when we have collectively sunk into a global virtual world, this profound need to confront with the truthfulness of a physical thought springs up with urgency, unaltered. Enjoying life, cosa mentale: balance in the walker’s gait.

 

    Yet, this ancient gesture isn’t meaningless, it induces a specific form of desire to portray. In an era, mainly filled with pictures made for an immediate consumption, Painting and Drawing are created to offer a different world: an artificial world whose materiality, space, along with its particular vibrations and freedom to portray yield a truly different experience of vision.

    Because, I repeat, what is essential is always elsewhere : only the painting’s poetry, the painted-poetry just as well ultimately justifies the painter’s work : if the painting isn’t brushed over by this dimension, my work is meaningless.

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Philippe Ségalard May 2020