Irisation, Chroma, Vibration... all palpitations of color, Diane Benoit du Rey's canvases hypnotize us. Last autumn, under the title "Hypnosis", her large-scale painted fabrics and sandblasted disk were displayed in the dome of the Espace Richaud in Versailles.
Comprising 50 m of painted hangings suspended between the coffered dome and the colonnade of the Versailles rotunda, and a large Colored Disk made from 400 kg of pigmented sand, this in situ installation invited visitors to a true pictorial experience. A real plunge into painting and color gradation. An admirable display of color in space, this masterpiece was the culmination of abstract work on light, begun several years ago.
Born in Versailles in 1989 and trained at the École supérieure des arts décoratifs in Strasbourg, Diane Benoit du Rey's vocation as a minimalist painter grew out of her observation of how light reveals things (spaces and people). Far from the general revival of interest in figurative painting and the vogue for hyperrealism, she has devoted herself for years to representing the phenomenon of light through a fascinating "chromatic exploration".
Following in the footsteps of Mark Rothko (currently exhibited in majesty at the Fondation Louis Vuitton 1) or the latest Hans Hartung, from the pulverization period, Diane Benoit du Rey considers and embraces painting as "luminous matter", as a source of light. By superimposing layers to bring out the radiant power of colors from the depths of the background, and to make them move in an infinity of nuances, the painter brings out the very substance of the paint, seeming here to infuse light into the juices of the colors, which are soon transmuted into colored vapors: Everywhere, it vibrates, it moves, it palpitates... Such is the case with the large Colored Disk installed at Versailles, where the central yellow cloud, like a beating heart, makes all the iridescent vapors surrounding it pulsate in a maelstrom of gradations. A hypnotic work, like the close-up paintings showing the subtle passages from blue to pink, from pink to yellow and from yellow to bluish green... Fascinating chromatic mutations where, among other optical phenomena, we can see phosphenes or retinal persistence, those colors and luminous spots that we perceive with our eyes closed.
This lumino-chromatic exploration, which goes beyond the flatness of the canvas which, as it moves, seems to be endowed with a third or even fourth dimension, is also carried out by the artist in 3D with his luminous sculptures, called Lumen. A sort of neon sculpture in lacquered glass, these hybrid objects are part painting, part sculpture, designed to "bring painting to light". Created in collaboration with a glassmaker, a lacquerer and a lighting expert, they were presented at Design Miami last December.
Until April 2, 2024. See Acumenno 39.
Solo show "Inside
Galerie Le Feuvre & Roze
164, rue du Faubourg-Saint-Honoré, Paris 8e
January 13 to 27, 2024
lefeuvreroze.com
Solo show "Lumen
Galerie Scène Ouverte
72, rue Mazarine, Paris 6e
March 2024
Publication: Hypnosis, catalog of the eponymous exhibition held from October 20 to December 3 at the Espace Richaud in Versailles, Lord Byron editions
