VINCENT BEAURIN


Memento vivi
Vincent Beaurin’s works are quiet, telluric, radiant witnesses.
Since his research undertaken in the 1990s—first as a designer and creator of objects, then, in no uncertain terms, as a visual artist—what is involved for him is the creation of forms which express his world and transmit it. His world—like our world—is neither figurative nor abstract, neither decorative nor speculative, and neither useless nor useful: it is all at once, loaded with a power clamoring only to be expressed, and irradiate and impregnate our retina. An impregnation which disturbs our perceptions of boundaries and givens, permitting the advent of a space, more fluid than the artworks, in which their forces and those surrounding them are in exchanges, and of a time, vaster than their observation, thanks to their optical potential and the “after-images.” I am obviously thinking here of the Ocelles, chromatic spectrums with endless variations, and of the “pictures” made of aluminum honeycomb panels, but also of the precious statuettes, the hybrid sculptures, the “standing mummies” of the “NUN” series, the eccentric deities as well as the monumental totems which Vincent Beaurin is erecting outside traditional art venues (Arch, Maldives, 2013; Fleur for the Al Hamra show, 2014; Tree of Life, Kuala Lumpur, 2015-2016;Quiero, Majorca, 2017). All of them give off something sacred, but it is an open, pantheistic, magician’s sacredness, where the infinitely large and infinitely small are one, and where the muses are colors, disciples chant color theories, and mystics are named Michel-Eugène Chevreul, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Paul Cézanne. Vincent Beaurin’s artworks are measuring instruments, of the near and the unattainable, of man and landscape, of the unsettling and art history. Hailing from a tradition of craftsmanship through gold and silversmithing training at the École Boulle, and recognized as a designer for his Noli me tangere collection (1994) and his collaborative projects with the Galerie Néotù, Andrée Putman and Alessandro Mendini, Vincent Beaurin attaches crucial importance to the aptness of forms and the completeness of their execution, lending his works a confident certainty, whatever their dimensions. This certainty and this obviousness are obtained through a pre-semiotic visual language: colors are neither sign-like nor symbolic, but emotional and atmospheric; forms are not complex but elementary and organic; the meaning is never transcendent but immanent. Everything is there, on view, overt, like in the early morning of the day of a heat wave, or the next day all wet from a majestic storm. Landscapes, climates, the mineral world and the sun’s cycle all form the horizon of an artist of contemplation, who reconciles in his works painting and sculpture, surface and volume, textures and outlines, self-presence and reflection about space. Because it is not a matter of merely creating, it is also necessary to show and organize the articulation of works between them, within arrangements which reveal them, and link them together, enabling them to encompass the viewer, and go beyond him, the better to trap and incorporate him (Yanomani, l’esprit de la forêt, Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain, Paris, 2003;The Fun of the Past, Mudam, Luxembourg, 2006;Avant la panique, Crédac, Ivry-sur-Seine, 2006; Le Spectre, Atelier Cézanne, Aix-en-Provence, 2010; Couronne, 2013; Etat alchimique, Brownstone Foundation, Paris, 2017; Hand-made color sculptures: some are paintings, some are statues, National Ceramic Museum, Sèvres, 2017; Show show, Galerie Julien Cadet, Paris, 2019). Beaurin’s work is equally about encouraging the questioning of the "traditional" categories of aesthetic experience: the plinth, the frame, color, univocity, the work and its off-field, as demonstrated by his recent "Organismes" series (2019-2022) into which each canvas, a body-like soothing presence, is only perceived through its dynamic exchange with the three-dimensional element that accompanies it, thus forming an open and vibrating organism.
Vincent Beaurin’s works are go-betweens, light, sentimental and strong. Never smooth, at times harsh, invariably physical, they are like those knucklebones, pieces of flint and pebbles which sometimes emerge on their surfaces, and which we are fond of handling in the palm of our hand. Memento vivi. They ask us to be there and situate ourselves, to remove ourselves from our liquid world to establish a contact zone to be used both physically and sensually, in a state of introspection and listening. To this end, they offer a powdered harmony, an intense calm, a vigorous serenity, that, needless to add, of the alchemist, but above all that of an artist drawn along by a radical quest: the quest for the exposure of optical and pictorial phenomena, forms of liaison and synaesthesia, and a sincere state of the world and art.

The works of Vincent Beaurin are part of the collections of the MNAM - National Museum of Modern Art - Center Georges Pompidou; FNAC - National Fund for Contemporary Art; MUDAM, Museum of Modern Art, Grand-Duc Jean, Luxembourg; from LVMH, Cheval Blanc Randheli and Christian Dior Couture; the Cartier Foundation for Contemporary Art; by Agnès B, from the MAD - Musée des Arts Décoratifs, from the Mobilier National collection.
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Born in 1960


Visuals


VINCENT BEAURIN

Tableau ocelle #2, 2023

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes, sand

ø 71 x 10 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Tableau ocelle #5, 2023

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes, sand

ø 71 x 10 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Tableau ocelle #1, 2023

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes, sand

ø 71 x 10 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Oiseau Paysage, 2023

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes, betacryl

144 x 57 x 38 cm | 56.6 x 14.9 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Oiseau Lune, 2023

Cast bronze, betacryl

142 x 60 x 38 cm | 55.9 x 14.9 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Miroir #3, 2023

Cast bronze

126 x 24 x 19,5 cm | 49.6 x 7.4 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Ocelle, 2022

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes

ø 71 x 10 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Organisme, 2022

Oil on canvas, polystyrene, epoxy, glass glitter

196 x 89 x 11 cm | 77.1 x 4.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Ocelle, 2022

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes

ø71 x 10 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Statue NUN, 2020

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes, corian

147 x 39 x 48,5 cm | 57.8 x 18.8 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Dais, 2022

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes

ø 40 x 32 cm | Ø 101.5 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Ocelle, 2020

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flake

ø 71 x 13,5 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Ocelle, 2020

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flake

ø 71 x 13,5 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Ocelle, 2022

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes

ø 71 x 10 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Ocelle, 2022

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes

ø 71 x 10 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Organisme , 2022

Oil on canvas, polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes

196 x 89 x 11 cm | 77.1 x 4.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Organisme , 2022

Oil on canvas, polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes

200 x 120 x 10 cm | 78.7 x 3.9 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Ocelle, 2021

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes

ø 71 x 10 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Ocelle, 2022

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flake

ø 71 x 10 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Organisme , 2022

Oil on canvas, polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes

196 x 89 x 11 cm | 77.1 x 4.3 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Ancrage, 2023

Polystyrene, epoxy, marble sand

ø 69 x 10 cm | Ø 175.2 in.


VINCENT BEAURIN

Ocelle, 2022

Polystyrene, epoxy, glass flakes

ø 71 x 10 cm | Ø 180.3 in.


Publications
Exhibition Catalogs

Avant le jour, 2023

Exhibition Catalogs

Vincent Beaurin - Incarnat, 2022


Media