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Artist Statement:
From the idea that reality and
conformism can be dull and
deceitful, an alternative way
of living, way of seeing
appears as a vital necessity.
I paint what we have forgotten
to see, a world apart. A world
that appeals to our memory and
to the collective memory that
existed before our individual
awareness: proto-memory.
Each one of my paintings tells
a wonderful story or describes
a virtual or plasmatic
landscape. The subjects are
half-monsters half-cells, half
fantastic half poetic. When
discovering my work the
spectator becomes actor, free
to interpret his visions
joyfully.
Neo-pop artist, I don’t try to
portrait daily life on my
canvas but instead enjoy
reproducing my singular
iconography on luxury objects
(humidors, tufted rugs, smart
cars, wine bottles,
jewelry...) to create a storm
in our every day environment,
permanently altering our
sensibility.
For rendering my colorist
poetry, I found no better
technique that “Hard Edge”
(notably used by Ellsworth
Kelly) to accentuate contrasts
and make colors vibrant with
life.
After validating my style by
travels in Europe, India,
Canada and the United States
-where was organized my first
solo exhibition almost 20
years ago, and numerous
encounters with prestigious
and ...
Further Information
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Artist Exhibitions:
Coming Soon!
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Artist Galleries:
Coming Soon!
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Artist Reviews:
Coming Soon!
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Collections:
Coming Soon!
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Commissions:
Coming Soon!
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Philippe Sokazo Biography:
| Biographical information for Philippe Sokazo can be found below. The artist may choose what information to display. Sometimes the artist chooses not to display personal information to the general public. |
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Age
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46
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| Gender |
Male
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| Status |
Married
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| Children |
1
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| Religion |
Love |
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| Education |
Masters of Fine Arts |
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| Hobbies / Interests |
not provided |
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| Favorite Artistic Medium |
Painting Acrylic
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| Favorite Arthistory Movement |
Contemporary Art - (Now)
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| Favorite Visual Artist |
not provided
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| Favorite Work of Art |
not provided
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| Biggest Artistic Inspiration |
Creation is first and foremost an act of survival.
Since childhood, I was always a dreamer and would loose myself in the Art that surrounded me. It was certainly an escape from a reality I found too harsh and in which I struggled to belong. That’s how I developed an iron will to paint what no one had painted before, and to create a unique aesthetic proposition that would feed me, make me travel the World, and bring me the joy of sharing my vision with others.
My paintings are all hand-made Hardedge acrylic. In their distinctive language of geometric and organic shapes, they narrate stories, encounters between probable beings from unconscious universes, sensations and landscapes that can be alternatively aquatic, aerial or virtual. I transform and colour my environment relative to this personal mythology.
My creations expose the concept of the two infinites, visible and invisible, and offer a positive perspective to our condition in a world bound by endless questioning. The creative process itself allows me to explore and exteriorise my philosophical and mystic interrogations.
Canada and the diversity of its contrast has been a fresh source of inspiration these past few years. Notably, it materialized in “Tales of the Rainforest”, a contemporary picturesque poem rich with the dreams and hopes that characterize this land.
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| Why Did You Become An Artist |
What I want to achieve?
• Wake-up society that I find sometimes too uniform: you cannot grow and prosper when you only look at one perspective; my painting in provocative and offers a different vision
• Expose the link between the infinitely large and infinitely small
• Millions of things live and surround us, whom we are not conscious of; I bring this subconscious to the surface; I feel it, so I paint it.
My colors?
• I was dyslexic when I was young. I used to express myself through colors. I was actually bad with coloring books (couldn’t stay within the lines) and ever since, I associate graphics and colors to verb (expression) and layout (mise en page).
• I can’t live life or feel emotions in half tones (I guess I’m extremely sensitive and shy, which I’ve accommodated in my life to “blend in” and function normally). My life is all or nothing, so are my colors.
• I play with the duality brilliance / dullness. Dullness is sociability, my colors are explosive.
• Saturation represents the world luminous and visible.
• Favorite colors based on the 3 primaries and derivates: green, orange, pink…
• Pink: symbol of revolution, evolution, provocation, (sexual) aggressiveness
• Orange: symbol of life and mysticism
• Green: realization, link between divine and earthly…
My Shapes?
• Emily Carr was saying that the forest, plants, rocks were sometimes more human (alive) than people. I feel that too.
• My abstract shapes morph (like unveiled) as my art evolves and particularly since I arrived in BC. Sailing, or walking through the Rainforest made me realize the variety and power of nature and certainly impacted my painting.
• Shapes appear to me, like revelations. I’m just the messenger.
• In that sense I understand and respect the animist believes of the First Nations people, who were able to live in harmony in a hostile natural environment. Today, the artificial world we have created while attempting to master the elements is proving to be a different kind of hostile, and you might consider that the cosmology I display on my canvas is my proposition to counterbalance this effect in a contemporary way.
• The first time I came to Vancouver, actually within the first hours, we got lost leaving the airport trying to go downtown and ended up at the museum of Anthropology and discovered Robert Davidson’s abstraction edge. This comforted me in my direction. I felt instantly connected and in convergence as my work was the reverse process of Davidson (he was moving from realism to abstraction, I’m somewhat going in the other direction).
• Authors like Plato, Maupassant, Poe, Lewis Carroll or Castaneda were able to cross the mirror of the “perceptible”. They have written about it, but I think no one had ever painted it before. I paint images of inspiration, unconscious images.
• Some of my works are more formal, encrypted alphabets. Other works focus more on abstract divinities, pictures of inspiration. These 2 types intertwine and fuse.
Hard Edge?
• Hard Edge is a discipline (tempted to associate it with martial arts, or a philosophy). It requires precision and concentration, repeating the same movements over and over again until reaching perfection.
• Layer after layer, the image is revealed to the light, like photography.
• I genuinely believe I have developed a unique technique to achieve a perfect smooth quality to the work (all hand made, while hard-edge painters usually use masking tape or other support to delimit colors)
• First time I saw hard edge used was in Matisse’s cutouts. I felt the impulse to bring them to the canvas and give this technique the nobility it deserves (Matisse started exploring his technique at the end of his career)
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| Your Personal Biography |
1960
Born in Toulouse in 1962, raised in a family of musicians and art collectors between Paris and the Côte d’Azur.
1980
After University studies in ethnology, he’s accepted into the prestigious Beaux-Arts School in Paris. He graduates in 1989 and soon decides to seize an opportunity to live in Miami where he works as Art Director for Teen Magazine.
1990
Before returning to Europe, he travels the world for inspiration: New York, London, Prague, Madrid, Bombay... His work is presented in various galleries and museums along side world-renowned artists like Alechinsky, Chilida, Riopelle and Matsutani of the Japanese Gutai Movement, who endorse Philippe Sokazo’s style and professionalism.
2000
Appointed member of honor by the city of Toulouse, France. The industry challenges him to apply his Art to manufactured luxury objects, such as jewellery, sculpted rugs, cement tiles, cigar humidors, wine bottles, fashion apparels and cars. These objects become part of the Sokazo World and are shown together with paintings in museums and galleries.
Settles in BC in 2005 where he discovered a new dimension of inspiration, light and energy.
Philippe Sokazo’s Art can be found in private and public collections in France, Spain, Andorra, the UK, the USA, Canada and Japan, and is current presented in Vancouver.
“Generous artworks, saturated with overpowering colors where grow geometric forms, waves, circles and ethnic signs. Abstraction that hits the retina. Seduction is immediate.”
Anne Tautou
Art Critic
“Philippe Sokazo’s work particularly strikes me by the opulence of multiple effects opposed to a remarkable apparent simplicity in the making and in the iconic organization of forms.”
Denis Milhau
Chief-Curator of the French Patrimony
and Professor of Art History at Ecole du Louvre in Paris
“Philippe Sokazo’s paintings use recurring pattern and color to weave stories which embody both real and imagined landscapes. The works in this exhibition are at times whimsical and amusing but also engaging and thought provoking.”
Carie Helm
Curatorial Assistant, Richmond Art Gallery
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