"Hopalong Cassidy" Painting

I studied art & design at the college of Beaux-Art in Chalon-sur-Saône, France and then went on to attend art school in Lyon. I still tend to think of myself as being a self-taught artist as I don’t have as such a traditional artists background training. I got back into painting & drawing after attending the Royal Drawing School a few years ago whilst living in Shoreditch in East London. I made a decision to move back and live in Marseille, France where I have my studio. I now dedicate my time to painting and more recently sculpting, although painting in oil and acrylic is really my main interest. Whilst my work may appear at first glance to be inspired by either pop-art or street-art culture, I aim to tell new stories from what appears to be typical stereotypes. I like to re-appropriate for myself toys, products, signage from a common background knowledge -then add my own memories of places I’ve been to and transpose these into a brash today’s world. A new story, a new meaning perhaps. I'm interested by how we’ve created false idols and use these stereotypes for our own needs; be that an ideology or just for some new commercial gain. In fact from very early religious times to today's consumerism, we have always liked ‘make belief’ and story telling. I find this idea at times quite repulsive and obstructive, yet at the same time it’s compelling. Like fast food, it’s can be quite disgusting and yet attractive all at the same time. How can a plastic doll, an action figure or a comic book hero, merely innocent toys or stories at their creation, have become role models, or commercial signs selling a product or service from a bygone era, be perceived as full of vintage charm. Then there is the skull, one of the most recognizable spiritual symbols since the Renaissance. It’s become an urban, rebellious symbol, sympathetic and fun, almost detached from its true meaning of death. I like to give the observer an opportunity to interpret in their own way and get them to venture outside of their comfort zone, confront them with a fun, fantasy world that sits between abstract and figurative observations, blurring all the barriers and frontiers that exist between us.