ARTIST PROFILE

christophe souques

  • France (b. 1971 in Paris)
  • Currently in Puivert, France.
  • Phenomenal Art a moment, an ambience where we feel connected yet totally unable to say why. It is a smile in the mind’s eye.

ARTIST STATEMENT

  I just noticed that this '' Art '' I am involved, which collects different experiences as a shamanic journey, or in relation to education in the nature of mind, and let the process flow as it is, this '' Art '' is not here to pretend to invent a new mode of expression, but it is just there to take care of the raw and lively atmosphere and makes visual of a reality beyond the existence and concepts ... I am happy when someone feels caught by the generosity of the work that is unconcerned by the constraints of wanting to be understood or be loved , that is not pretending to hold a progress of mode of communication ... and be open enough to see something inspiring to the value of clarity, beyond all definitions, representations or other needs to know in order to see. .. Thank you for your appreciation ... Having a good time while knowing nothing, and continue to share honesty in being as i am, nothing to accept or to reject, simply animated by the constant flow of what goes and through myself, shiny with the brightness of the atmosphere of perfect intelligence always released ... .. and that can not be played because it is itself who plays !! '' 21/09/16

 Works is always related to the meetings,  the place,  time and circumstance, The impermanence of the fabric, and the brightness of essence,

   
and reveals reflexion on the support that goes beyond the expression, imagination, or our own ad. … this life can not be organized and Emloyed with systems according to our point of views or other fantasies of our fixed and isolated currents .. There is an universal order spacious, and more open, which organizes ,and gather any unique contribution and even it plunges us into the truth of what it means to be at the service for our benefit , and the benefit of all …


BIOGRAPHY

 


BIOGRAPHY

Christophe was born in Paris in 1971.

In 1996, he joined a collective workshop in Lyon, attended by about twenty artists, all self-taught and it is there that he will meet the sculptor Robert Thouret, the young painter Joseph Camara and the chess player John Sammut.

In 1998, Christophe met the Bosnian painter Mirsad Hadzikaric in the south-east of France, marking a turning point in his accidental approach to painting. They worked together in a movement that Mirsad had created, and called "SCARECROW" and, together with other painters, including David Granata, they wrote a manifesto titled "Beauty without elegance". Many exhibitions will speak about this movement, in Paris, in the South East of France, and also in Sarajevo, during the Art Festival of 2002. It was a real School of Art, far from the academic schools, with a a manifesto expressing at the same time principles of expression such as aeration, agitated seizure, non-anecdotal, and also a manifesto pronouncing a strong commitment in the face of a social climate where Art died, contaminated by the commercialism of a dehumanized system and the hegemony of decoration and conceptual modes of thought. In 2002, the movement will be brought to justice with the case of the censored gallery in Saint Tropez, and will be released by the court of Justice of Draguignan.

After these five years in the Scarecrow movement, Christophe wanted to follow a more personal path, and he went back to 0, pushed to escape from any influence ...

In 2006, the merchant Charles Zalber discovers it and decides to expose it to the Grand Palais, in the middle of his collection of painters like Basquiat, Tapiès, and Picasso and Cocteau's drawings. It will be exhibited with the Galerie Lucie & Silegman during exhibitions in Strasbourg in 2007. The death of Charles Zalber, three years later, will put a therm to this Parisian adventure.

He continued to travel between Asia and the Orient and during a period of hermit in the foothills of the Pyrenees, Christophe began to integrate sculpture into his painting; shapes created with rags, pieces of wood, bits of string or other materials found and amassed during various pilgrimages, including the long march to Santiago de Compostela in 2005 and 2011.

Essentially, this "Art" is his daily practice ... a devotion and commitment that surpasses the concepts of failure and success and that share for real, without propaganda or personal interest.

Where a world is outshined, a humanity is rising.

 

 



PRESS


  • Dar Cherifa welcomes two artists for an art residency here in Marrakech, presenting an exhibition though out the month of April, opening presentation Wed 5th April 2017

    Sophie Marie and Christophe Souques are international artists enthusiastic about living here in the heart of the Medina where Art is revealed as the living example of unification of different cultures and traditions - '' the meeting of rivers''.

    An ideal context for co -creation of transformative, inspiring and empowering works.

    The ''contemporary indigenous'' work of Christophe Souques and the ''new precious symbolic'' work of Sophie Marie, together offer windows that ask to be opened, unifiying an ancient and modern.

    A fortunate meeting with Mr Abdellatif, director of the Riad, literary café, Dar Cherifa, gave rise to this project celebrating shared values of artistic creativity supporting empowerment through education.

    More than an art exhibition, this is also the opportunity to support a project of great value.

    Whilst assisting with an educational exchange trip to Morocco, the artists Sophie Marie and Christophe Souques were deeply moved by the work of "Education for all" choosing to donate 20% of the sale of any of the art to the association.


    '' Education for All '' is a Moroccan association providing support and access to education for girls from rural communities in the Atlas mountains, providing boarding houses in Asni, Dar Tinmel and Talat N Yacoub.

    Education of every girl is also the education of new generation.

    Http://www.efamorocco.org/index-en.htm .


    April 5 , 2017 Dar cherifa present :


      '' An unexpected gift ''     << The World is filled with passages, passages filled with beings, passengers that pass, beings filled with worlds.Worlds where spirits frequent voids that reveal spirits. Honored to be living in the heart of the Medina, to listen to the book of instruction that is life and its code; free and accessible visions, creating images to be read as phenomena, inseparable from the clear nature of mind. An unexpected gift. >>

     


    Dar Cherifa et Abdellatif Ait ben Abdallah accueillent deux artistes en résidence, ici à Marrakech tout au long du mois de mars, se culminant avec une exposition en avril.
    Sophie Marie et Christophe Souques sont des artistes internationaux, enthousiastes à l'idée de cette collaboration où l'Art se révèle comme l'exemple vivant de l'unification des différentes cultures et traditions : "la rencontre des rivières". Un contexte idéal pour la co-création d'œuvres transformatrices, inspirantes et vivifiantes. Le travail "indigène contemporain" de Christophe Souques et la "nouvelle symbolique précieuse" de Sophie Gabrielle Marie, offrent ensemble des fenêtres qui demandent à être ouvertes, unifiant d'anciens fragments jusqu'à une image moderne.


    Plus qu'une exposition d'art, c'est aussi l'occasion de soutenir un projet de grande valeur. La rencontre heureuse avec Abdellatif Ait ben Abdallah, directeur du Riad, galerie, café littéraire, ''Dar Cherifa'', a donné lieu à ce projet, au profit de l'association, célébrant leur valeurs communes de l'artsoutenant l'épanouissement à travers l'éducation." 20 % des ventes seront données à l'association. En effet, tout en assistant à un échange éducatif au Maroc, les artistes ont été profondément émus par le travail d' ''Education for all'' ; une association marocaine qui apporte un soutien et un accès à l'éducation pour les filles dans le pays en provenance des communautés rurales. Cette association crée des pensionnats dans l'Atlas, précisément Asni, et à Dar Tinmel et Talat N Yacoub.
    Http://www.efamorocco.org/index-fr.htm






  • << L'œuvre de Christophe Souques possède une identité forte propre à son créateur. Informelle, son unicité est indéniable ; sur chacune de ses toiles la poésie et le mystère nous emportent vers des mondes oniriques... Du bleu lumineux au vert ténébreux, du brun enrouillé au rouge flamboyant, la palette de l'artiste est large. Travaillées dans l'épaisseur ses couleurs sont des univers de matières en fusion ; les nuances y foisonnent à l'infini des possibles... Ici ou là, empreintes de vie, ou âmes en suspension dans l'impermanence, surgissent des figurines métissées de bois, chiffons et cordes entrelacées, la minutie avec laquelle elles sont réalisées est étonnante ; même si de l'une à l'autre, le détail est presque imperceptible à l'œil, chacune d'elles porte et assume sa différence... Toile bleue, maintes nuances nous emportent sur la mer des grandes solitudes où flotte une humanité en mouvement, porte entrouverte sur d'autres réalités : la lumière nous mènera-t-elle sur des chemins insoupçonnés ? Là-bas, une toile noire, des elfes ou peut-être des anges émergent du néant et se jouent des profondeurs abyssales... Sur cette autre, des cariatides funambulent dans l'espace, certaines s'élèvent, d'autres se dissimulent, n'en restent qu'empreintes à demi estompées ; soudain le vide prend la parole... Les compositions de Christophe Souques repoussent les limites de l'abstraction. Leurs interprétations laissent place à tous les probables et nous entraînent, comme dans un jeu de miroirs, dans des abysses où le spectateur se rencontre avec lui-même. Voyage chamanique, nous entrons en relation avec des mouvances, des énergies qui nous échappent autant qu'elles nous habitent... >> Philippe Lemoine
  • ‘‘ PHENOMENAL ART ‘‘

    BY RAM CHATLANI 

    I have always been surrounded by original art. My mother has always been a prolific painter. Her sisters also produced art and my sister has produced a series of paintings and drawings that I find truly remarkable. In the 1970’s I met an artist, Nikki Rowntree, who painted illustrations for a book I had written at the age of fourteen. I still have those pictures. In the 1990’s I met Simon Smith, a shamanic artist who painted some really imposing works. I still have them. They include depictions of the wizard Merlin, of native American landscapes and mind scapes. They are what I would call ‘fantastic art’, bold, big and very evocative. I met Christophe in about 2004 and since then he has regularly provided me with works of art that suggested he could produce art that was ‘curious’. Recently, Christophe spent about a year dedicated to painting a series of pictures that are images of his experiences over the last seven or eight years. Experiences that all of us have in the current of life. During that year I saw little of Christophe and during that time I happened to redecorate the entrance hall of our house. [seewww.tourne.eu.com] It is refreshing to have blank clean walls. Like a blank canvas, an empty notebook, they just wait for the new material. Without the space-the canvas, the wall, the notebook, where can the inspired work be recorded so that others may taste it? I happened to speak to Christophe and suggested he might wish to hang a painting on the new walls. Eventually he came, not with one, but with 22 canvasses. I confess that when he arrived I was nervous. One or two paintings can be swallowed in a house of this size, but twenty-two is another matter. Whatever reservations I had were very quickly dispelled as it became clear that what he had produced over the period of his painting retreat was what I describe as ‘phenomenal art’. I am not an expert on art, but I have experience of a lifetime of art in the home. I have lived with the artwork of painters as they evolve, seeing styles change, seeing techniques become more daring. Christophe’s paintings did something that I have never experienced in a house-they completely refreshed and uplifted the feelings and vibration present in every space in which a painting was hung. I discussed this phenomenal art with a friend of Sebastien Frère, a well known painter of the Vermillion coast, the home of many famous impressionists of the era. She was not at all surprised. In her view, it is very much the function of art to transform space. In my case, there is another dimension because I understood that many of the canvasses Christophe hung were paintings that evoked experiences he had while working with me in Taoist, shamanic and meditation arts over the last six years. What is so thrilling about this is that each painting evokes something of an experience that is unspeakable. That is what artists seek to do, to evoke something that you feel, that you know has or had form but that no longer exists outside the mind. How can we be truly involved in and touched by art? For the painter, it is obvious; he is the conduit through which the expression passes. For the admirer of the art, there is something in the painting that we seek association with, that speaks to us, which touches our experience. Christophe’s phenomenal art expresses the unspeakable. In my case, perhaps it does this because of our having worked together. At the same time, others who have seen the paintings have been impressed, touched, moved. It is possible that through this artwork, others may be similarly touched and that is why I have encouraged Christophe to consider offering to others a journey: from encounter, to experience to expression. It is not the painting alone that evokes the feeling, that lifts the spirit, the vibration, it is the whole event Phenomenal art can lift our vibration, the vibration of the space in which we live. It can support a process of coming to a point of profound rest and release, like letting go of baggage that has been carried for too long. Finally, when it is hung on the wall, it provides a regular reminder of how to let go: we must encounter that which is holding us back. We must experience its arising and falling. To express its passage is optional, yet this aspect, the expression, is what I believe can secure a stage in the healing process. In this process, we let go of any personal evaluation of our capacity or skill. What we need to express, how we express it, this will emerge without consideration or forethought. And therein lies the key. Entering a process where thought and strategy are applied only to the selection of material, to preparation for the encounter helps us to recognise the value of Bodhidharma’s advice : don’t listen to your thoughts. The thoughtless process in art, in dance, in so many of our artistic and beautiful Regardless of the way in which you encounter this art, it is clear that a doorway is open to all of us to make expressions that we need to make in order to lift our vibration. The use painting, either as an artist or an aspirant provides a very fine medium. Add to this an intention to make the encounter, to meet the experience and then to express it and the formula is sure to evoke a lightness of sensation that uplifts your space and uplifts your soul. Encounter, experience, expression: phenomenal art workshop with Christophe Souques.’’