Quentin Spohn, Untitled (8)
Pastel on paper
2021
20×29.7cm
(unframed)
While reflecting his often satirical perception of the society, Quentin Spohn´s drawings are also, in line with the works of the surrealists who deeply inspired him, the expression of his own obsessions. His dark but sharp vision of the world echoes the thoughts of other pictorial movements he investigated such as the German New Objectivity Movement and the Ashcan School, resulting in a similar awareness of a political responsibility. Moreover, the topics he explores drive him to revisit a certain number of traditional pictorial categories such as portrait, genre scene, landscape… Picking as well in image culture as in popular culture, his drawings sometimes refer to satirical drawing or fantastic imagery. After an artist residency he attended in 2017, new influences came and nourished his work, taking from now on its source from the tradition of the Chinese landscape while continuing to bring the uncanny into realistic frames.
The works presented here are part of a 9 pieces’ series made of pastel on black paper. Inspired by lacquer painting landscapes by Vietnamese artist Truong Van Thanh, they result of a new experimentation consisting in putting the source image upside down in order to perceive it differently. This ultimately gives rise to a kind of dreamlike expressionism, halfway between abstraction and figuration. The depth and dark aspect that could be perceived in Truong Van Thanh original lacquers is embodied here in shades of black and white which might evoke the dark recesses of the soul.
Quentin Spohn is a French artist, born in 1984 in Colombes. He graduated from the Villa Arson in Nice and received several distinctions including the “Prix de la jeune creation de la ville de Nice », the Yishu 8 Prize and the Art Collector Prize. His work has been exhibited in numerous exhibitions in France, Germany and Belgium.
