Entre ombre et lumière
19.04.24 - 23.05.24
Jean-Michel Comte and Mane Phély
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Featuring the selected work of the two artists
Jean-Michel Comte, born in 1975 in Nice, France, currently resides and works in Geneva, Switzerland. The picturesque Provençal light of his hometown has long served as a wellspring of inspiration for him. Beginning his visual arts journey in 1994 at Villa Thiole in Nice, he furthered his studies at Toulon Beaux-Arts from 1996 to 2000. Subsequently, he embarked on a three-year course at HEAD Genève under the guidance of Peter Roesch and Albertine Zullo. From 2017 to 2020, he established his studio at the Taulan Art Factory in Montreux before returning to Geneva.
Jean-Michel Comte's artistic approach is characterized by gestural spontaneity and instinct. His works encapsulate the raw immediacy of each movement. Delving into the depths of turbulent inner landscapes, he translates emotions and specific memories into concealed narratives, frenetic scribbles, pulsating contours, and splattered forms. His drawings, born from the depths of shadowy ink, lay bare the intricate complexity of art. Described as a self-fashioned lexicon and a reconstructed reality, his oeuvre embodies an organized chaos, as eloquently expressed by Céline Muzelle in 2019.
Reflecting on his process, Comte shares, "I cover the sheets, I saturate them, I scratch them, I retouch and rework things all the time. I am expressive and repressive. I uncover things and I cover things up."
Born in 1965 in Nogent-sur-Seine, Mane Phély works and live in Olivet, France. Even at a young age, the earth she kneads in her hands and the trees surrounding her evoke a deep creative excitement within her. This connection with nature nurtures her genuine desire to create, her longing to shape materials, to engage in a dialogue with them, and to transform them through her work.
2014 marks a turning point in her artistic journey. While in residence at Espace Solidor in Cagnes-sur-Mer, dedicated to contemporary jewelry, she discovers cardboard, a humble material that gradually reveals its complexity under her fingertips: its flexibility, resilience, malleability, and robustness. In her Provencal studio, Mane Phély's artistic gesture becomes more defined as she hones her technique. She joins the "La Créative" Crafts Boutique in Biot in 2017 and opens her own studio-boutique in 2018. That same year, she exhibits at the Kultur Reverenz Gallery in Basel. Leveraging techniques acquired through her jewelry work, she creates unique pieces, elegant sculptural jewelry she calls her "wearable sculptures."
Mane Phély concludes her residency in 2019. Her move to her studio in Olivet, on the banks of the Loiret River, marks a new phase in her work. There, she continues her conversation with materials, seeking to elevate and transcend them, to unveil all their unsuspected qualities. She works on large-scale wall sculptures, evoking the nature that inspires her: an ancestral, geological mineral nature, a lush vegetation caught in infinite cycles – volcanic lands, mysterious forests, springtime flora.
