"The art of Agustin Portillo joins the expressionist current which has notable interpreters in our country, such as Jose Clemente Orozco, Jose Luis Cuevas, or in more recent times, German Venegas. Portillo's earlier work, imbued with pop and conceptual elements, has been replaced by a totally distinct style, filled with provocative messages which reveal, in an explicit and bruising manner, the most bitter face of our epoch.
Inspired by the diverse culture of Chicago and attentive to images that appear in the press, in magazines, and on the internet, Portillo presents a stinging chronicle of American society, through noxious scenes that take place, for the most part, in gaudy social meetings of the upper middle-class or in dwellings of little importance. In both cases, the artist portrays a pathetic atmosphere that speaks of the spiritual decay of contemporary man, the void and chaos of a society controlled by love of money that has brutalized human beings until they are converted into grotesque monsters which escape reality through drugs, alcohol, pornography and the unchecked accumulation of material goods. (...)"
Germaine Gomez Haro
La Jornada Semanal, Sunday, January 8, 2006
“In 2003, Mount Stuart Trust invited Mischa Haller to make new work on the Isle of Bute. He made four visits during two years and in all four seasons, observing island life and creating a unique documentary series of photographs. “on Bute” tells the story of the identity of a cummunity and its dayly life at the beginning of the 21 st century. The project is a celebration of the island, showing the spirit of the place, people and their times. The photos explore a dynamic society, at times in transition, detached from the mainland and often displaying a strong sense of humour.
These exhibitions in Paris and book continue Mischa Haller’s development of portrait and reportage photography. Over the past half decade, he was spontaneously and responsively recorded individuals and groups of people in the process of everyday living. He uses a personal, documentary style of photography and frames momentary encounters using both classical and subject-based compositions. Haller says he is interested in “real people and real moments. Not just how things look but how it felt to be there”. In this sense, many of the smaller details hint at a larger, existential truth. (...)”
Sophie Crichton Stuart
Programme Director, Mount Stuart Visual Arts Programme
on Bute, published by the Mount Stuart Trust in April 2005
"The paintings and prints created by Evanston artist Diane Thodos over the past four years embody an intensity that summarizes her development as an artist. At the same time, these pieces represent the artist’s indirect and abstract response to complex emotions generated by the tragedy of September 11, 2001, and its aftermath, including the conceptual war on terrorism and ongoing ground battle in Iraq. Thodos’ works reflect on human and emotional states that are timeless in their troubling expressionism."
Nathan Harpaz
Manager & Curator, Koehnline Museum of Art, Des plaines Turbulent times : The expressionist Art of Diane Thodo
How did you come with the idea of writing a book, then directing a movie and finally to show your drawings and paintings?
First of all I have to say that I am very happy that this text I wrote when I was 16 years old will get to be published this year. Then there is my first Art show. Everything happens through meeting people, it's been luck, opportunities, things coming together, like by chance. I wrote this book because I had to. Something inside of me was pushing me to do it. Someone. It was like thinking of him.
Where does your inspiration come from?
I don't mean to express something in particular. I don't feel I have an inspiration. I just go and do what I have to do. It has more to do with desire. I just feel I have to do it!
What does your art work bring to you?
I always wanted to be a painter. In life you're never really at the deepest of yourself. I feel I am closer to that point when I paint, but then this is not the question. I never think when I paint, and I like to be in an activity that does not need thinking or planning... I don't really see myself as really making art. I never try to make something nice or beautiful when I paint or draw. And if I do come up with something that looks beautiful, I have to get rid of that beauty or for me the work will be lost.
"And as a sculptor, Kennett is one of the highest degree. As to what moves him inner-most, it is no doubt, many works testify, suffering and moreover, death. But his reputation now made he doesn't choose to live in it. He is actually in quest of something else. Bronze, too dependent on the limitations of its various patinas, doesn't fully satisfy his new expectancies. He wishes to integrate colour, and furthermore light. And so we are confronted with strange works speckled with small, shiny squares of enamel. It's a clear break with his former work. As it seems, Kennett, like the snakes he enjoys, is shedding his old skin.
It is interesting to see come forth the human figure, that never was, in fact, absent of his work, portrait being with him a regular practice. But here, it is idealised heads we are talking about. One of them is covered as with a mask or make-up of different coloured enamel but this apparel can also be interpreted as a protective envelope for a wounded soul. It might indicate that Kennett is seeking to approach the primitives, an art of conjuring and of spells.
In all cases, the squares of enamel that he chooses for their impersonal industrial character, introduce a geometrical element that contradicts the suppleness of his gesture, the smooth ease of his model. Another apparent abandon. This works question us."
Sylvain Lecombre,
Direction des Affaires Culturelles de la Ville de Paris.
“We could spend hours lost in the contemplation of the living dresses of Didier Hagège, so they can finally reveal their special atmosphere made of unexpected breath and familiar perfumes we can feel hidden underneath the images.
Then we feel like going behind the paintings to really touch them and, getting closer inside the art we expect to find mysterious answers to unexpected secrets coming from “over the rainbow”... Looking for the right distance to watch them, we understand that we should walk and move in front of the paintings so we can embrace every detail revealed by different lights and points of view.
From here, we can see a bee or maybe a cicada. From there appears a fish bone, and over there a floating flower seems to be trying to escape. Attracted by their vibrating colours, our eyes finally come back to the shining dresses. This is the world of Didier Hagége, complex and moving geography where spring seems to be spreading from all over (…)”
Azouz Begag
Printemps de mousseline, Défilé, catalogue, 2006
“If the inspiration comes from cinema, Jérôme François approach is in return totally devoted to painting. Everything is dedicated to it, everything brings us back to his fundamental questioning and every iconographic excursion in his work leads back to it. Be it a question of screen, focal or mise en abîme, of narration, freeze-frame or abstract composition, we find ourselves face to face with a piece of research which aims to proclaim the perpetuity of a mode. Be it that he borrows his motifs from the seventh art, makes use of the projection mode to reproduce them, frames them as seen from the projectionist’s box, Jérôme François has one aim only : to render painting onto painting (...) The influences here are diverse. In matters of recovery, Jérome François art owes as much to the ready-made style of Marcel Duchamp as it does to the example of Nouveau Réalisme ; as for the way he manipulates the images, he owes as much to Pop Art’s fragmentation technique as he does to the syncopated technique of an artist like David Salle ; where style is concerned, he owes to the experience of a work such as that of Richter."
Philippe Piguet
Jérôme François, destination peinture, Arthotèque de Caen
Michel Dubois’ photographies are modern still life expressing the permanence of objects and revealing the hidden side of the non living things. He collaborates with the most prestigious advertising agencies worldwide, working especially for famous luxury companies. His images have received many awards and distinctions from “Club des Directeurs Artistiques de Paris” plus an Award of Excellence from Communication Art in America. At the beginning of the new millenium, the technological revolution is for him a real source of inspiration. The digital image purify his eye and brings a new work about the apparent formal perfection of contemporary industrial productions. His different shows organized since then mix different series of giant images dealing with the ambiguity of today’s representation and genetical mutations Frontal, puting back together the different series made from 2005 to 2007, is published in 2007.
"The interaction between light, movement and sound is the center of our artistic research. As a matter of fact this art we've been creating since 1998 aims to work light as our material using time as our tool. The traces of moving lights that we can still see long after their disappearance, as drawings in space, are actually the remembrance of lights passing. This phenomenon of persistence of vision allows us to create virtual objects in real space. The viewer 's eye becomes the backing of this creation as the luminous lines get printed one after the other on his retina, changing colors as they're fading while new traces are already drawing another picture over the first one. The fleetingness of these mental images linked to the immateriality of different sound or video effects opens a new world to the public between two and three dimensions, mixing listening and watching in one unique experience."
The Eiffel Tower, symbol of the French capital is 300 meters high. It was built by Gustave Eiffel in 1889, if you go to the top you can have a panoramic view of the capital. The Eiffel Tower is listed as historic monuments and world heritage of UNESCO, it is also the ninth most visited site in the country.
The Louvre Palace is a former royal palace, stretching over 135,000 sqm, the Louvre is the largest palace in Europe, it houses one of the richest art museums in the world: the museum Louvre. The Louvre Museum is the largest museum in Paris: 210 000 60 600 m2 including the exhibitions and 1 km of tunnels. Located in the heart of the city the Louvre has a long history of artistic and historic conservation of France. The original Louvre was a fortress built by King Philippe Auguste in 1190, one of its main tasks was to monitor the Seine, one of the traditional ways borrowed during invasions and raids from the time Viking.
The Opera Garnier is situated in the 9th district of Paris, you will learn ballet and opera in the magnificent halls built in the Haussman style. The Paris Opera has contributed through his art training center for vocational training and further training of singers and dancers. The Paris Opera's mission is to make accessible lyrical and choreographic works and encourage the creation and representation of contemporary works. It has two halls: the Palais Garnier (home of the Ballet de l'Opera National de Paris) and the Opera Bastille.
The Bastille fortress once used as a prison was demolished July 15, 1789 by a private contractor who sold some of the stone as souvenirs, and gave way to the column of July. Today the Place de la Bastille, is surrounded by cafes and restaurants and the Opera Bastille, but we can still see the remains on the platform of the metro line 5 from Paris a special paving has been designed to trace the outlines on the floor of the historic Bastille.
The Arc de Triomphe is a monument of the 9th arrondissement of Pari, whose real name, Arc De Triomphe was given to him because the avenues around her star shine. The Arc de Triomphe was built in 1806, he was part of the national monuments of high historical connotation. At his feet lies the tomb of the Unknown Soldier of the First World War. It houses the eternal flame, commemorating the memory of fallen soldiers and never dies.
The Paris-Nord station, also called Gare du Nord, is established in the 10th arrondissement of Paris, is the head-Paris rail network serving the North of France and neighboring countries (Belgium, Netherlands, Great Britain and Germany). This is the first station in Europe in traffic and the second in the world for its ability travelers. Opened in 1846 by the Society of Northern Railway, the North Station is the subject of a registration as a historic monument since January 15, 1975. The Paris-Nord station 1500 manages traffic per day, which is by far the record of France. It surpasses the other four major railway stations of Paris Est, Paris, Lyon, Paris Montparnasse and Paris Austerlitz.
This site is served by the metro Saint-Sulpice and St Germain-des-Pres. The district of St Germain is located in the 6th district, along the Boulevard St Germain where you will find the Abbey of St. Germain. Centuries ago, the abbey was the only thing that exists in this neighborhood. Before the many cafes and trends before the great restaurants in St Germain des Pres was only an isolated church constantly flooded by the Seine, and which made the area uninhabitable later it dried up the land and the mura is Seine.Le Bourg Saint-Germain was formed in the twelfth century and then had 600 residents, including future revolutionary Marat, Danton, Guillotin. Today, St. Germain is one of the most fashionable parts of Paris.
The district of Montparnasse is located in the 14th arrondissement of Paris, on the left bank of the Seine, around the Boulevard Montparnasse and Boulevard Raspail. It was absorbed by the city in 1860. The name was given by students in reference to neighboring Mount Parnassus, home of the Muses of Greek mythology. The hill was razed to trace the Boulevard du Montparnasse in the eighteenth century, taking a walk in the city. Since 1973, the tallest building in the city is the Tour Montparnasse. This is certainly the tallest building but as with most of the skyscrapers is the view from the top, and not that of the ground that counts.
The Quartier Latin is on the left bank of the Seine in the 5th arrondissement, with the heart of historic Sorbonne. It takes its name from the exclusive use of Latin in courses offered by schools and universities located in the medieval quartier.Le Latin Quarter is a district of Paris's best-known world. This is a neighborhood popular with students and teachers, due to the presence of many academic institutions, consequently, many bookstores in literature, history, philosophy and medicine are in the neighborhood.
Gare de Lyon is one of the seven terminal stations of the SNCF network in Paris, it is located in the 12th arrondissement. It is both a mainline railway station (Clermont-Ferrand, Dijon, Besançon, Grenoble, Valence, Saint-Etienne, Marseille, etc. ...) an international station (Geneva, Switzerland and Italy) and a station on the suburban network (Héricy, Moret, Montargis and Fontainebleau) performing services to the south of Paris with the R line Transilien. This station is distinguished by its square tower 67 meters high and covering all four sides of the clock faces of 6.5 m in diameter, stopped after the storm of December 1999, the clock was restarted in February 2005 .
The Exhibition Park is the largest exhibition and fair area in France. The first buildings date back to 1923 to accommodate the Paris Fair, but the Second World War was a cessation of exposures, the site even being occupied by the military. The 1950s saw the emergence of new shows like the cycle of heavy vehicles or general agricultural competition. In 1970 a new building of 72,000 square meters is open, increasing by half the park. From 1996 to 2006, half of the facilities are modernized. The site also offers three auditoriums and meeting facilities. In September 2008, the mayor of Paris announced the creation of an office building 180 meters high called Triangle on the site of the exhibition.
Montmartre is a former municipality in the department of Seine, annexed by Paris in 1860, its name comes from Mons Martis (Mount of Mars) because a temple dedicated to Mars (god of war) was built in the Gallo -Roman, he was on the mound. Montmartre is now a district of Paris north of the capital in the 18th arrondissement. The hill of Montmartre is one of the main sights of Paris, Montmartre is more that is the culmination of Paris: 130.53 mètres.On Access to the top of the hill with a funicular or in a staircase of 222 steps.