Nu aux bras levés, tribute to Pablo Picasso

2014
Acrylic on linen canvas
200 x 110 cm
Studio work

Tribute to Pablo Picasso

“The Nude with Raised Arms is half human and half animal, as are many tribal masks… The enchanting eroticism of the body is underlined by the axis in low-angle shot. The brown and red colours, the striation of the shapes, sometimes obtained by scratching the colour, stresses the bestial femininity of this nude that embodies ” the sexual energy in the rough, as the image of the vital force”.

Drawn from the article by Marie-Laure Bernadac
Musée Picasso Paris
“Les chefs d’œuvre” (page 36)
Editor : Réunion des musées nationaux – Prestel 51991

It is a study that I wanted to show.

… I very much appreciate the design, the force that radiates from the posture of this woman, proudly standing,
Simple and obvious : a life pulse in the rough.
It is one of my favourite Picassos, a small gouache of 25 by 32 cm that radiates an extraordinary vital force.
I was seeking to paint dynamic women… that do not only exist for the onlooker, the man, but for the pleasure of being alive, to Be herself.

I haven’t found many in the art world.

 

I have chosen to revisit the works of great Masters, naked women painted by men, not just any men : Sandro Botticelli, Gustave Moreau, Paul Gauguin, Gustave CourbetÖ
Each of these well known painters have changed how women are perceived. They have, each one in his own time, created a new vision of woman and an innovative pictural approach.

I did not want languid bodies, awaiting, offered, women in a passive attitude, virgins covered with a pile of tissues, angels… heroins of mythologies…

I wanted to represent bodies of women alive, present, carnal…
I have ´maturedª this subject for a year, from the choice of each painting to the style of representation…

I have already worked on women as a subject, my women surfers :
the first ones I have tattooed, symbolising Life to me, the freedom of these women surfing on the waves, mastering the tumultuous ocean, alive, image of the ancestral woman, original, contemporary, joyful, a warrior, in harmony with explosive Nature.

This time I have chosen bodies of naked women likely to represent all women, from ancestral to modern, from androgynous to pulpy.

I love the Aspara sculptures in the Khmer temple of Angkor, Cambodia, voluptuous, carnal, simply beautiful ; I am moved whenever I see them, a pleasant emotion, an apeasement.
They radiate an accepted femininity, tranquil, a great presence without struggle : ´I am this woman… I live, I am alive… I accept myself as I am…ª

The title of my exhibition ´The Untouchablesª came to me as these accomplished, ´perfectª, art works seem to me just that : untouchable.

But my sensitivity as an artist and as a woman prevailed.
And I wanted to confront these masterpieces.
How to paint these women ?
How to transform them ? in 2014.

As I love Hugo Prattís work, especially his water colours, I have taken the liberty to interpret his comic strip style paintings, black and white backgrounds… with a few variations.

I wanted to change the perception of how these artists are perceived ;
with my tattoos, I wanted to softly touch these female bodies, to create a ´meskinª, tender, powerful, harmonious, voluptuous, sensitive…
reflexion of the most profound.

I want to pay hommage to women.
Woman has been around since the beginning of times too… :))
A large part of humanity… and many of us are living in this world under circumstances similar to the Untouchables in India ??
Often very violent circumstances.
Tattoos to remind us that some women have been tattooed for painful reasons, politics… announcing death, such as in the concentration camps, or on the other hand characteristic personal and positive signs claimed by tribes…

Transforming these tattoos into lace, into small dots, various small inoffensive patterns… as an act of reparation…
I absolutely want to respect the sacred signs of all the people of the World, and have developed my own personal tattoos. No reference to anything else :
I just wanted to create an impression of beauty, of a precious body, the naked woman but protected by her tattoos, like a reflection of the inside, of the profoundness of being… feminine.

And I have let my unconsciousness and my emotions express themselves.
I also wanted to tattoo a mannequin, just for the beauty of it,
as an amusement.