Untitled Drawing

« Concentrating the essential of his artworks on a drawing practice and the nude motif, Arghaël renews a long history of bodily representation from prehistory with the Venus of Willendorf, to the ideal of ancient perfection with the statuary Praxitèle, to the cult of flesh, exposed raw by Egon Schiele or Lucien Freud. Plunging his drawn figures into a mysterious indeterminacy of animal or human postures, the artist invites us to enter the vortex between beast and man, capturing their overflowing life forces in the hollows of their dancing flesh. Drawing women, men and trans alike, Arghaël plays with our representations of sexual organs, either voluntarily eluded or exposed, questioning the notion of identity as he revisits the classic figure of the hermaphrodite through the prism of gender studies. From this point of view, Arghaël’s artistic protocol borders on a kind of purity, a true nexus of gesture. As if the artist’s charcoal and pastel strokes on raw linen canvas were exploring and echoing the invisible forces under our own skin. » Philippe Godin, art critic ( Under My Skin, Paris - April 2023 )