Plant-based art by Grégoire Fournier
About the series of videos “Rencontres”
This series of videos aims to show the magical journeys of plant-based inks on paper, their unforgivable and colorful encounters. Their interactions are unique and invite us to relax, meditate and escape for a moment from the hustle of our daily lives. My goal is the show the vibrant and living nature of these natural colors and offer an immersive and meditative experience to the viewer.
Title : Traversée sur le fleuve doré (Journey on the Golden river)
Technique: Photograph (Ball made out of dried Sophora Japonica flowers placed on a coconut shell, on top of a piece of cotton dyed with these flowers and in front of a plant-based painting from the series Taking Over also prepared with these flowers. The flowers were handpicked in Lyon, France. The Sophora Japonica tree is native to China and was then introduced in Japan and later in European countries).
About the series of photographs “Mémoires”
In this series, I make up mystical settings with the colors I produce myself (inks, pigment-lakes, dyed fabric), personal artworks, the tools I work with, as well as other natural elements I found in nature (leaves, branches, shells, barns, etc.). I imagine rituals and scenery where the color and the plant are the main subjects. Through these photographs, I intend to pay tribute to the plants but also to the whole process of making colors and working with them, and to share the powerful memories we build together. Photographs are a great way to capture the living and vibrant nature of vegetal colors, at every step of the process, from picking to cooking the plants, to making inks out of them and composting the plant or let it dry. It’s a cycle during which beauty and enchantment never end.
Title : Taking Over – Moon
Size : 30 x 20 cm
Technique : home-made plant-based inks (rose petals from my mother’s garden and logwood) on paper.
About the series of artworks “Taking Over”
The Taking Over series gathers works on papers, pieces of wood, glass and other materials which I entirely cover the surface of with home-made plant-based inks and paintings. The fresh inks are smashed onto the surface in a way that gives the impression that it is covered by roots, forests or seaweeds. They are here to evoke the birth and powerful growing of the plants and pay tribute to the vegetal reign. The color is deep and omnipresent, and just like roots that move freely, take over all the room. It’s a personal and colorful way of celebrating Nature fighting back and taking back her rights.