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BIOGRAPHIE
French artist Anaïs Boileau (b. 1992) was raised under the blue skies and strong sun of
the south of France, among the vineyards of the garrigue near the Roman city of Nîmes.
By reframing and recreating the landscape and the objects that she finds in her native
land, she looks to create !moments of joy” through her work – a space for us to breathe in
a world that can so often feel heavy.
My work is about going back to something very simple, very present”
Her focus is on colour, light, shape and form, as she plays and experiments at the
boundaries between abstraction and reality, painting and photography, using the
outdoors and the dark shadows of the bright midday sun as her creative studio.
Her first, award-winning series, Plein Soleil (2014), features majestic portraits of sunworshipping
women on the beaches of the Mediterranean, shot in the same style as the
local architecture. The colours are vibrant. The light stark. And the geometric shapes
softened by the tangly vegetation.
La Grande Motte (2019) is the start of her experiment with collage. Here, she mixes cutouts
of her own and archive images, with digital brushwork to re-render the geometric
forms and pyramidal structures of the architecture of the futuristic-looking seaside resort
of La Grande-Motte into a new exotic universe. My process is to experiment, to build, to create – and to create something
attractive” For her series Soleil Brûlant (2022), which she produced at the family farmhouse over the
pandemic lockdowns, she collected and salvaged paper, plants, fabrics and materials,
objects long forgotten in the loft, or found in the garden, to, in a different way, play and
explore with colour, light, shape and form.
From this more figurative work emerged her latest ongoing series, where she uses
brushwork (pastels, paint and China ink) directly on her prints to create unique pieces –
organic, almost floral works of the imagination.
Anaïs lives between Paris and Nîmes, alternating between her artistic projects and
photographic commissions for the likes of Le Monde, M magazine, The Wall Street
Journal and The Financial Times. She also works with brands including Hermès, and
LVMH for their Journées Particulières, showcasing the diversity of métier and savoir-faire
at LVMH Maisons.
She studied photography at the Lausanne art school ECAL (graduating 2014) and at
Central Saint Martins in London (2017).
She is part of Futures, the Europe-based photography platform, having been nominated
by the Centre Photographique Rouen Normandie in 2022.
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CV
Market position
Anaïs Boileau composes her images with scraps of paper, plants, canvas and salvaged materials. The whole creative process is conceived in the same place. Her studio is located in an old farmhouse where she composes and realize her photographs by using this place as a living space to create. She is interested in the raw object, for its materiality, its form; in the optics to divert it from its use. The object becomes a surface, multiplies under the effect of the sun. She uses the color as a revelation of light. The vivid shades create rhythm in the image. Some of the more pictorial images are created from photographed paintings where the physical matter of the paint and the grain of the paper contrast with the colored touches of digital paint. Together, these photographs form a body of images that stand on the blurred edge of reality and abstraction. The image surfaces are intertwined and various textures are created by the different production techniques. She works on her images intuitively, the images are composed and decomposed in effects of surfaces and layers. The shapes seem to move in a drunken rush of color. The long and marked shadows imply time, a precise moment like a summer memory. In an evocation of sensations, we feel the salt, the humidity and perhaps a little of the Mediterranean. And this sun, bright, burning, which underlines everything and circles it with black. A sun which was already at the very heart of her first series Plein Soleil.
CV
Solo Shows
2024: Soleil Brûlant – Gallery Espace Saint Ravy (Montpellier)
2023: Arlésienne – Lycée Emiland Gothey/Musée Nicéphore Niépce (Chalon-sur-Saône)
2022: Bain d"Ombres – Centre d'Art Contemporain de Briançon
2021: Plein Soleil – Galerie Ephémère (Arles)
Group Shows
2024: Radioscopie de la France – Ministry of Culture/BnF (Paris)
2023: Soleil Brûlant – Contour Gallery (Rotterdam)
2020: Plein Soleil – Athens Photo Festival
2020: Plein Soleil – Photo Kathmandu
2019: Plein Soleil – Encontros da Imagem International Photography (Braga)
2018: Plein Soleil – Thessaloniki PhotoBiennale
2017: Beyrouth – CACN, Centre d’Art Contemporain de Nîmes
2016: Plein Soleil – International Fashion & Photography Festival (Hyères)
2015: Aperture Summer Open: Black Mirror (New York)
Awards & Selections
2022: Futures 2022, a platform for emerging European photography
2017: Plat(t)form, Fotomuseum Winterthur
2016: Portfolio Days & Night, Centre National de l’Audiovisuel – CAN (Dudelange)
2016: Public Prize, International Fashion & Photography Festival (Hyères)
2016: Elie Saab Prize, International Fashion & Photography Festival (Hyères)
Residencies
2023: Excellence des Métiers d"Arts, Musée Nicéphore Niépce (Chalon-sur-Saône)
2022: Grant from Ministry of Culture/Bibliothèque nationale de France
2022: Archiville, Villa Noailles (Hyères)
2018-2019 : Villa Noailles (Hyères)
2017: Elie Saab (Beirut)
2014: Hong Kong Design Institute
2024: Soleil Brûlant – Gallery Espace Saint Ravy (Montpellier)
2023: Arlésienne – Lycée Emiland Gothey/Musée Nicéphore Niépce (Chalon-sur-Saône)
2022: Bain d"Ombres – Centre d'Art Contemporain de Briançon
2021: Plein Soleil – Galerie Ephémère (Arles)
Group Shows
2024: Radioscopie de la France – Ministry of Culture/BnF (Paris)
2023: Soleil Brûlant – Contour Gallery (Rotterdam)
2020: Plein Soleil – Athens Photo Festival
2020: Plein Soleil – Photo Kathmandu
2019: Plein Soleil – Encontros da Imagem International Photography (Braga)
2018: Plein Soleil – Thessaloniki PhotoBiennale
2017: Beyrouth – CACN, Centre d’Art Contemporain de Nîmes
2016: Plein Soleil – International Fashion & Photography Festival (Hyères)
2015: Aperture Summer Open: Black Mirror (New York)
Awards & Selections
2022: Futures 2022, a platform for emerging European photography
2017: Plat(t)form, Fotomuseum Winterthur
2016: Portfolio Days & Night, Centre National de l’Audiovisuel – CAN (Dudelange)
2016: Public Prize, International Fashion & Photography Festival (Hyères)
2016: Elie Saab Prize, International Fashion & Photography Festival (Hyères)
Residencies
2023: Excellence des Métiers d"Arts, Musée Nicéphore Niépce (Chalon-sur-Saône)
2022: Grant from Ministry of Culture/Bibliothèque nationale de France
2022: Archiville, Villa Noailles (Hyères)
2018-2019 : Villa Noailles (Hyères)
2017: Elie Saab (Beirut)
2014: Hong Kong Design Institute
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