ALEXANOR's STATEMENT 

 

When a child I was fascinated by the numerous butterflies flittering  around flowery meadows.This time is no more.

 

Today butterflies are in danger of extinction like many other insects and animals.

 

With my artist’s capabilities, I want to contribute to slow down disappearance of biodiversity and the “collapse of the living” by communicating the beauty of butterflies‘ wings patterns to  the general public and to decision makers. This led me to a deep thinking about the practical and philosophical change in the relationship between humans and nature.

 

In the past, we could  directly perceive the world with our own eyes, having an  immediate sensory experience of things that we could interact with.

Today, what lays at the heart of nature and living organisms ‘operation (bacteria, chromosomes, double stranded DNA, etc.) eludes our basic perceptions.

 

However, scientific developments also show us the intricacy of the various level of organisation of the living.  Nature operates simultaneously at various scales.

As an artist, my work tries to make the link between what we can spontaneously see and what is too small to be noticed.

Without going down to the microscopic level, I tried to go beyond  the classic appearance of butterflies’ wings to bring the focus  on the aesthetic patterns that those wings contain.

 

In this way I create hybrids forms in between nature and geometrical design.

The genomic revolution is influencing my recent artistic work. Genome sequencing has enabled to decipher of the “alphabet of the living” composed of a sequence of 4 nucleotides A T C G repeating itself in various orders to form specific genes. This complex composition principle formed by simple base units, has inspired me to select within butterflies‘ wings a base pattern; and thereafter multiply this selected pattern by varying its position in a longer and more complex structured chain.

 

So, my work is about questioning the natural and the artificial.

Isn’t art distancing itself from nature?

Doesn’t art tend to construct a parallel world, taking inspiration  from the natural reality and creating at the same time an imaginary universe that is different and autonomous?

 

My work is also demiurgical (drawing an artistic remodelling of Nature through new imaginary species for which genetics could one day give birth); and phantasmagorical  (creating an artwork lending itself  to multiple interpretations and meanings like the Rorschach inkblots).