Exhibition « Arborescences » by Lydie Arickx at the Château de Chambord

Lydie Arickx is a painter and sculptor, a major figure in French expressionism.

Presented by Roland Topor, she had her first exhibition in 1979 (pastels and oils).

Then she presented her work in Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and the United States where she exhibited alongside Francis Bacon in New York.

Since 1991, Lydie Arickx has set up her studio in the Landes at Angresse where she works on large formats and tackles monumental sculpture.

This workshop is for her a place of experimentation where she researches and adapts new supports and materials for her creations, concrete, emery cloth, wood, fabrics, bitumen, charcoal, linen canvas, photographic paper, earth, metal, bronze, 3D prints, gravel, ash, resins and fibers …

Anxious to share her art with the public, she participates in awareness-raising workshops in schools and businesses, featuring contemporary art and performing arts.

She performs live monumental performances, such as at the Conciergerie de Paris and Roubaix (a performance 200m long and 3m high).

His works appear in major international public collections, the National Museum of Modern Art in Paris, Center Pompidou, Palais de Tokyo … and in the public space, Paul-Brousse Hospital in Villejuif, Center Hospitalier Intercommunal de Créteil, IUFM of Mont-de-Marsan, MACS Saint-Vincent-de-Tyrosse.
Lydie Arickx has exhibited in recent years at the Cordeliers, at La Piscine de Roubaix, at the Conciergerie, at the Biarritz Historical Museum and at the Château de Biron.

She also does writing work and has published two books at Editions Diabase, « We live » and « Ink and still ».

« Expressionist artist », of course.

His work abuses the face, twists the material and accounts for the violence of the world.

But his constant search for new materials and new forms feeds his work beyond any label, to express as accurately as possible the fears, the joys or the miraculous appearances, sometimes with a touching sweetness.

Powerful, free, protean, her work questions life in all its forms and makes Lydie Arickx one of the most inventive and endearing artists.

In Chambord, the « Arborescences » exhibition is quite simply life, its efflorescence, its joyous plurality.
For four months, over 1,000 m2, 150 works (drawings, paintings, sculptures, installations) are presented, half of which were created for the occasion.

The arborescences of the exhibition meet the real tree of life embodied by Leonardo da Vinci’s majestic double revolution staircase with its structure reminiscent of that of DNA, a major symbol of vital impetus, as well as the plant space that surrounds the monument.

A giant canvas reinterprets Boticelli’s Spring … we think of Germaine Richier, Bosch, Rubens, Greco, Goya, Courbet, Ensor or even Rebeyrolle … a whirlwind of colors, materials, and formats absolutely astonishing.

Before visiting this exceptional exhibition, let’s discover two passages of « Ink and Encore »:
« The form comes from a void. It is beautiful this movement towards the outside, there is nothingness and I am the abstraction of it, this ample gesture, this gesture in which the body of the sower abandons itself.

The volume is born, random, as if the fingers were starting to dialogue with the material, the forms to indulge in a conjuring trick … the hands plunge and transmit the flesh to the clay.

I have the impression of a densification, that the space takes the weight of the air which is embodied. « 
or :
« When you are in front of a work … the vision which is imprinted on the body activates the unconscious memory, the imagination germinates in mute and blooms … What I look at agitates me, the emotion is always virgin. .. we think while looking and then nothing matters but drunkenness … The artist at the heart of the process translates only what he receives … the power of a bewitching mystery. . « 

Exhibition « Arborescences » by Lydie Arickx at the Château de Chambord from May 30 to October 17, 2021.

Lydie Arickx is represented by the Capazza de Nancay gallery, partner of this exhibition curated by Yanick Mercoyrol, director of heritage and cultural programming at the Domaine national de Chambord.

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