La possibilité d'une île - The Possibility Of An Island (2011 - 2012)
"Beyond the sea exists a land where I can become a Man.
Beyond the mother, an island awaits me.
The boundary between present and future is a ray of light."
This text can be found on the back of the canvas “Beyond the sea” which closes the series “Rejected by the sea ". These words illustrate the link between the two series of works, the crossover towards “The possibility of an island”.
Face to face
Olivier Dubois-Cherrier, interviews by Sophie García López.
He paints the stages of adult life, along with his conceptions of the world, his states of mind, his desires, his love. Olivier Dubois-Cherrier was not introduced to painting from an early age, despite the natural expression of a natural talent for drawing. Even though it is true that some members of his tribe excelled as artists. His trajectory resembled that of a child inculcated with the moral values of work and purpose. He was pushed away from what could otherwise might have been his original path.
Once his mission accomplished, once he became a Man, he analysed and put aside these “moral values”; he learned how to paint. In the end, his work as an artist represents in a way his genesis, his source. He paints to free himself from his demons of all kinds. Today, freed from his past and his history, he presents the series of works “The possibility of an island”: a logical step in the continuity of “Rejected by the sea”… The birth of a new Man? No doubt. An unrestrained interview with the artist, unbridled, and about to set sail.
Sophie Garcia Lopez: A brief retrospective on your exhibition?
Olivier Dubois-Cherrier: For three years, through the work “Rejected by the sea", I contented myself with observing the stigmata of human behaviour on the beaches of Dominican Republic where I reside. For the past few months, while I continue to question myself about the meaning of life, I have apprehended the ecological carnage resulting from our presence on earth. The rereading of Michel Houellebecq's novel, "The possibility of an Island” while I was working on this project, brought me a reflection charged with a new, cynical and emotionless optimism: a “possible future”. The world will outlive man. Life will resume its course after human beings have disappeared. That, in itself, is excellent news.
Could we say that you paint love?
I sincerely believe that man's perversion is a societal factor, that as long as we are alive we need love. Yes, I paint love; the one everybody aspires to, the one that everybody should be entitled to. The sphere we live in is not a world of love, there are bubbles, and I live inside one of them. Love makes me cry every time, I consider it a force, an energy, and I try to share it.
If this harmful effervescence of the world culminates with the end of mankind, it’s not important. The experience will have had the merit of having been lived. And I am happy to be part of it. I see myself as the defender of human ecology and not only that of nature.
Waiting, that of artists, what can we say?
Expectation tends to impose itself. At the beginning I suffered a lot from it. Changing behaviours seems sometimes impossible. However, in artistic creation the expectation is there. It controls everything. I’m now learning the “laisser-faire”, which is a concept of control that must be acquired to break loose from the notion of time imposed by oneself and by others. For me that goes even further, this control allows me to apprehend without anguish the time that passes on us, our family, and our life. We age better when we have tamed the expectation. We can foresee the future.
The roles that life has given us change, we surpass obstacles. I no longer wait for something, I have confidence, I can go quietly. Just like for my painting, I no longer burn the stages. If an idea of peace was the incipit of my canvas, it should remain so. It cannot turn into pure radiance and improvise itself as revolutionary. I paint what comes to me, what I can take the time to visit, to appropriate, nothing else. My style is mine; I do not sell my soul.
Your intentions, your impressions?
It’s difficult to translate the sensations and the “hows”. When I am alone and at work in the studio, I realize that I communicate enormously with the canvas. I believe that ultimately I communicate with my unconscious and that the canvas is just an intermediary between the conscious and the unconscious. With experience and maturity I learn, through painting, to know myself, to accept myself as I am and to love myself a little more. I have caught myself saying while I’m painting: “Don’t overdo it Olivier… Take it easy… Let what has to come happen." We find this famous “letting go”, a sacred apprenticeship!
I love and I live in density, in depth, in richness; I do not conceive a painting otherwise. At the same time, I admire lightness; one day, perhaps, I will be able to paint in white?
Your temptations?
They are the unbalanced “hows”, the possible permissions. Some mornings, when I arrive at the studio, I dread disappointment, frustration and even anxiety in the face of the work of the previous day. Today, as I walk through the door, turn the key in the lock, I strive not to judge, to accept what has already been done and to start again from where I am. It helps to put a limit to myself, not to overflow the cycle, to fear a little less certain returns to the studio. Sometimes I also stimulate myself by mentally looking at all the work accomplished in recent years. I reassure myself because I know that eventually I will reach the end of this conquest.
But what proves to be terrible in painting, and artistic creation in general, is that it never stops. I can’t be completely satisfied with the work done. It is an endless adventure; I feel attracted by an unattainable ideal which makes me, each time, take the risk of the empty canvas.
Ambitions, conquests, quests?
I aspire to follow the path of my creative work serenely. The completed canvas, when it has nothing more to say, transmits an authentic inner peace to me. And when a painting manages to please me beyond what is acceptable, then I get the icing on the cake: Happiness. This route is both brief and long at the same time, it is the one that will lead me to the end of my life. Everything blends, everything interferes, my life as a man, as a father, as a grandfather, as an artist. Splitting doesn’t seem to strike a good balance, neither the ideal. It is important to me to find harmony everywhere. I want to enjoy everything. I have taken possession of my own history as a man, with all its vagaries, I recovered my name, the notion of time no longer scares me, I crossed so many stages.
A painting, what does it mean for you?
A painting should summon me three times. At the first glance, it must invite me to penetrate in the room where it is displayed by means of an emotion provoked by its composition, forms or colours. Then, comes what I feel, deeply and independently from any given interpretation. Finally, I approach, I seek what's underneath, what is hidden there. If a painting does not reflect all this, I don’t feel anything. I feel the need of getting lost in the painting.
And you, what do you hide?
My dark side, which I did not accept. It took me an enormous amount of therapeutic work. But ever since I did an exercise of painting with another artist, my ego is much more serene. Today, my facets, my faces, and my characters, are more in harmony. We make colossal efforts to hide ourselves from the others, and often we do too much to dissimulate. I did the same as everybody else. I painted as I lived. This is still the case, but with more maturity.
In painting, superpositions nourish each other. What is underneath nourishes what is on the top. It makes it richer. Layers, squares inside other squares… A square is a window, an opening. I exist in the hope of another possible world, in the possibility of an island.
My roots have influenced what I’ve become. The squares in the series “Rootings” are traces of creole huts. I was looking for a land to deposit my story, here I recognized it and I am then able to part from it. I am leaving The Caribbean soon, this time for good, in order to discover new worlds. I am no longer just the mestizo son of a white father and a mulatto mother; from now on I exist in today’s world, in life. A human being creates the meaning that he gives to his life.
Have the limits been crossed?
Yes, I have also burnt my wings… Another life, a different stage. I like limits. The possible is for today… I am at peace with the past. My painting has not ceased to evolve. My life has been my work since 2005, without pretension. Nothing is inseparable. My life is dynamic, moves, tries to make sense. After “The beautiful Promise”, far from the world of the dunces, I am finally reunited with myself. I am a painter who has taken his time to become one. I continue to fear fame and therefore, success. But I’m working to overcome that as well!
Informal Remarks…
" I have decided to take the risk of simplicity and sobriety. It’s not going to be easy to negotiate with myself…"
Interview by Sophie Garcia Lopez, art journalist.
Beyond the mother, an island awaits me.
The boundary between present and future is a ray of light."
This text can be found on the back of the canvas “Beyond the sea” which closes the series “Rejected by the sea ". These words illustrate the link between the two series of works, the crossover towards “The possibility of an island”.
Face to face
Olivier Dubois-Cherrier, interviews by Sophie García López.
He paints the stages of adult life, along with his conceptions of the world, his states of mind, his desires, his love. Olivier Dubois-Cherrier was not introduced to painting from an early age, despite the natural expression of a natural talent for drawing. Even though it is true that some members of his tribe excelled as artists. His trajectory resembled that of a child inculcated with the moral values of work and purpose. He was pushed away from what could otherwise might have been his original path.
Once his mission accomplished, once he became a Man, he analysed and put aside these “moral values”; he learned how to paint. In the end, his work as an artist represents in a way his genesis, his source. He paints to free himself from his demons of all kinds. Today, freed from his past and his history, he presents the series of works “The possibility of an island”: a logical step in the continuity of “Rejected by the sea”… The birth of a new Man? No doubt. An unrestrained interview with the artist, unbridled, and about to set sail.
Sophie Garcia Lopez: A brief retrospective on your exhibition?
Olivier Dubois-Cherrier: For three years, through the work “Rejected by the sea", I contented myself with observing the stigmata of human behaviour on the beaches of Dominican Republic where I reside. For the past few months, while I continue to question myself about the meaning of life, I have apprehended the ecological carnage resulting from our presence on earth. The rereading of Michel Houellebecq's novel, "The possibility of an Island” while I was working on this project, brought me a reflection charged with a new, cynical and emotionless optimism: a “possible future”. The world will outlive man. Life will resume its course after human beings have disappeared. That, in itself, is excellent news.
Could we say that you paint love?
I sincerely believe that man's perversion is a societal factor, that as long as we are alive we need love. Yes, I paint love; the one everybody aspires to, the one that everybody should be entitled to. The sphere we live in is not a world of love, there are bubbles, and I live inside one of them. Love makes me cry every time, I consider it a force, an energy, and I try to share it.
If this harmful effervescence of the world culminates with the end of mankind, it’s not important. The experience will have had the merit of having been lived. And I am happy to be part of it. I see myself as the defender of human ecology and not only that of nature.
Waiting, that of artists, what can we say?
Expectation tends to impose itself. At the beginning I suffered a lot from it. Changing behaviours seems sometimes impossible. However, in artistic creation the expectation is there. It controls everything. I’m now learning the “laisser-faire”, which is a concept of control that must be acquired to break loose from the notion of time imposed by oneself and by others. For me that goes even further, this control allows me to apprehend without anguish the time that passes on us, our family, and our life. We age better when we have tamed the expectation. We can foresee the future.
The roles that life has given us change, we surpass obstacles. I no longer wait for something, I have confidence, I can go quietly. Just like for my painting, I no longer burn the stages. If an idea of peace was the incipit of my canvas, it should remain so. It cannot turn into pure radiance and improvise itself as revolutionary. I paint what comes to me, what I can take the time to visit, to appropriate, nothing else. My style is mine; I do not sell my soul.
Your intentions, your impressions?
It’s difficult to translate the sensations and the “hows”. When I am alone and at work in the studio, I realize that I communicate enormously with the canvas. I believe that ultimately I communicate with my unconscious and that the canvas is just an intermediary between the conscious and the unconscious. With experience and maturity I learn, through painting, to know myself, to accept myself as I am and to love myself a little more. I have caught myself saying while I’m painting: “Don’t overdo it Olivier… Take it easy… Let what has to come happen." We find this famous “letting go”, a sacred apprenticeship!
I love and I live in density, in depth, in richness; I do not conceive a painting otherwise. At the same time, I admire lightness; one day, perhaps, I will be able to paint in white?
Your temptations?
They are the unbalanced “hows”, the possible permissions. Some mornings, when I arrive at the studio, I dread disappointment, frustration and even anxiety in the face of the work of the previous day. Today, as I walk through the door, turn the key in the lock, I strive not to judge, to accept what has already been done and to start again from where I am. It helps to put a limit to myself, not to overflow the cycle, to fear a little less certain returns to the studio. Sometimes I also stimulate myself by mentally looking at all the work accomplished in recent years. I reassure myself because I know that eventually I will reach the end of this conquest.
But what proves to be terrible in painting, and artistic creation in general, is that it never stops. I can’t be completely satisfied with the work done. It is an endless adventure; I feel attracted by an unattainable ideal which makes me, each time, take the risk of the empty canvas.
Ambitions, conquests, quests?
I aspire to follow the path of my creative work serenely. The completed canvas, when it has nothing more to say, transmits an authentic inner peace to me. And when a painting manages to please me beyond what is acceptable, then I get the icing on the cake: Happiness. This route is both brief and long at the same time, it is the one that will lead me to the end of my life. Everything blends, everything interferes, my life as a man, as a father, as a grandfather, as an artist. Splitting doesn’t seem to strike a good balance, neither the ideal. It is important to me to find harmony everywhere. I want to enjoy everything. I have taken possession of my own history as a man, with all its vagaries, I recovered my name, the notion of time no longer scares me, I crossed so many stages.
A painting, what does it mean for you?
A painting should summon me three times. At the first glance, it must invite me to penetrate in the room where it is displayed by means of an emotion provoked by its composition, forms or colours. Then, comes what I feel, deeply and independently from any given interpretation. Finally, I approach, I seek what's underneath, what is hidden there. If a painting does not reflect all this, I don’t feel anything. I feel the need of getting lost in the painting.
And you, what do you hide?
My dark side, which I did not accept. It took me an enormous amount of therapeutic work. But ever since I did an exercise of painting with another artist, my ego is much more serene. Today, my facets, my faces, and my characters, are more in harmony. We make colossal efforts to hide ourselves from the others, and often we do too much to dissimulate. I did the same as everybody else. I painted as I lived. This is still the case, but with more maturity.
In painting, superpositions nourish each other. What is underneath nourishes what is on the top. It makes it richer. Layers, squares inside other squares… A square is a window, an opening. I exist in the hope of another possible world, in the possibility of an island.
My roots have influenced what I’ve become. The squares in the series “Rootings” are traces of creole huts. I was looking for a land to deposit my story, here I recognized it and I am then able to part from it. I am leaving The Caribbean soon, this time for good, in order to discover new worlds. I am no longer just the mestizo son of a white father and a mulatto mother; from now on I exist in today’s world, in life. A human being creates the meaning that he gives to his life.
Have the limits been crossed?
Yes, I have also burnt my wings… Another life, a different stage. I like limits. The possible is for today… I am at peace with the past. My painting has not ceased to evolve. My life has been my work since 2005, without pretension. Nothing is inseparable. My life is dynamic, moves, tries to make sense. After “The beautiful Promise”, far from the world of the dunces, I am finally reunited with myself. I am a painter who has taken his time to become one. I continue to fear fame and therefore, success. But I’m working to overcome that as well!
Informal Remarks…
" I have decided to take the risk of simplicity and sobriety. It’s not going to be easy to negotiate with myself…"
Interview by Sophie Garcia Lopez, art journalist.