"Heinz Baked Beans" Painting

Vincent Bernier was born in Québec, Canada in 1977 and is now based in Manchester, England. He first trained as a graphic designer before moving into art education and fine art, but his work has never lost its graphic roots. His practice moves between figurative painting, hard-edged abstraction and collage, building scenes around looking, desire and the stories we inherit. He starts with found images, personal material and fragments of art history, then reworks them into his own visual language. Often, the work carries the charge of a love story. Tender, physical, uncertain and slightly dangerous. Bernier is drawn to the queer gaze because it can hold beauty and threat at once. It allows the male body to become vulnerable, worshipped, pursued, exposed or withheld. In the studio, he layers acrylic, paper, oil and ink on wooden panels, preparing the surfaces to feel aged, handled and richly textured. He sands back, repaints, redraws and interrupts the image until it sits somewhere between revelation and concealment. Myth has become a central structure in Bernier’s work. Earlier pieces drew on stories of disappearance, heroic friendship and journeys into uncertainty. More recent work continues this interest through ancient narratives of power, grief, mortality and transformation. He is currently developing an art book that brings together illustration, narrative and modern technology, extending his interest in storytelling beyond the painted surface. The abstract works sit alongside the figures as emotional residues. Colour, texture and shape become traces of touch, memory and pursuit. Together, the works ask who gets to look, what is allowed to be desired, and what always stays just out of reach.