Wonderful Magic Realism of Jacquet

I have always loved art ever since I can remember. As a child, I loved painting with water colours. In early 1990s, while living in Imola (Italy), I had done a short introductory course on oil paintings. At the same time, I love looking at art and knowing the artists.

This post is about a French artist called Philippe Charles Jacquet, whom I discovered some time ago and whose art-style I like very much. Apart from talking about Philippe Charles Jacquet and why I like his art, this post briefly touches on some other artists whose work I like. 

Philippe Charles Jacquet

Here is some information about Jacquet which I have gathered from internet:

Jacquet, born in Paris in 1953, studied architecture at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. After working as an architect for about 20 years, in 2000 he decided to focus exclusively on painting. His background in architecture is reflected in his artwork in the symmetrical and geometric landscapes as well as in the way he sculpts rocks and designs houses. Brittany coasts and estuaries feature commonly in his works.

He did not have any foral training in art. He works with industrial gloss paint, an unusual medium for artists, which gives a sheen to surfaces as it dries. He begins by painting his plywood surface with a uniform base of an off-white color. Creating a variety of textures is an important part of his paintings, for which he uses different techniques such as creating several transparent layers and using a razor blade to scratch the surface.

Jacquet currently lives and works in Pantin, a suburb north of Paris, in France.

What Captures Me in Jacquet's Works

I prefer traditional approaches to arts and I am not much of a fan of the concept art. Liking or not liking an artist's work can be very subjective - something which touches me very deeply, may leave you cold or indifferent, so I don't know if looking at Jacquet's works would affect you the way it does to me - I can look at his paintings literally for hours.

Jacquet's art calms me down and sometimes they draw me into a meditation-like trance. Looking at some of his paintings make me feel as if I am in a tunnel, going deep inside myself. Some of his works make me experience a kind of silence - I love books and words, and perhaps because of that, the voices in my head are always talking, thus, I love this experience of silence.

I love the colours he uses - a lot of pale colours, a lot of greens and blues and an occasional red. I like the early mornings or late evenings of his paintings where a lighted window, often with a vague presence of someone inside, calls me like a beacon. I like the pebbled surfaces underneath the water and along the sea-shores, and the thousands of blades of grass which seem to be moving in a gentle breeze. I like the boats anchored or floating gently on still water. I like the lonely figures standing still, lost in thought, waiting for something or someone. I like his lone bicycles moving along the edge of the water. And, I like the stairs cut into the rocks which come down towards the water.

There are some of his paintings which I wish I could have on a wall in my room, so that I can look at them when I fall asleep or when I wake up. However, I love the fact that I can find a lot of images of his paintings on internet, so that I can have them as backgrounds on the screens of my computer and tablet and I can keep on changing them.

So thank you Mr. Philippe Charles Jacquet for your wonderful magic realism and for giving me so much joy. I am glad that in 2000 you decided to follow your passion and devote full-time to paintings.

My Other Favourite Artists

Philippe Charles Jacquet is not the only artist whose works I like!

One of the first artist whose work I loved was B. Prabha, whose paintings of peasant-women and fisher-women with elongated bodies were published in the Hindi weekly Dharamyug during 1960s. I think that her art-style was somewhat inspired by the Mannerism school, which had developed in post-renaissance Europe in 16th and early 17th centuries. During renaissance, artists had developed techniques focusing on realistic representations of human bodies, ensuring life-like proportions and perspectives. In Mannerism, artists started to move away from realistic towards more emotional representations, giving rein to their imagination and fantasies. Perhaps, she was inspired by the works of Italian artist Amedeo Modigliani (1884-1920) who had used similar elongated bodies in some of his portraits.

Through my father, who was active in Socialist Party of India under Dr Ram Manohar Lohia, I had met some well-known Indian painters such as Makbool Fida Hussein and J. Swaminathan, whose works I used to like. I remember sitting as a child with Hussein saheb at India Coffee House in Connaught Place in Delhi in early 1960s, which was located in those days where today there is the underground Palika Bazar - at that time, it had the coffee house in the centre surrounded in a semi-circle by the different state emporiums in wooden buildings. I also remember walking towards Triveni Kala Sangam with Hussein saheb to see his exhibition and meeting Dr Zakir Hussein, who was then the vice-president of India. I also remember the dismay of all the socialist friends of my father a decade latter, when Hussein saheb had defined Ms. Indira Gandhi as Durga and painted a whole series of paintings on that theme.

In Europe, I have been absolutely smitten by the paintings of Caravaggio and the surrealism of Salvador Dalì, both of whom do not need any introduction and have enormous fan followings. At the same time, in more recent times, I like many lesser-known water colour painters, some of whom I follow on Instagram - I love to watch their Reels where they show the development of a painting.

In The End

I hope that through this post you can understand why I like the art of Philippe Charles Jacquet. If you also get a special feeling when you look at these, do share about it in the comments below.

I am passionate about water-colours but they don't affect me like the art of Mr Jacquet. I think that to be so affected by art is a gift, a special way of communication between me and the nature through its forms and colours.

I dream of having time to dabble with water colours though I suspect that I like expressing myself more through words than through colours, so that dream will continue to be only a dream. But I can imagine the kind of art I would like to make even if the reality never matches that fantasy. In the mean time, I can enjoy the works of artists like Philippe Charles Jacquet!

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Museo - The Camera Museum of Gurgaon

Museo, the camera museum of Gurgaon in NCR (India) is a vibrant cultural space in a rapidly growing urban area, which needs many more such spaces. An initiative of the well known photographer Aditya Arya, who is passionate about photography conservation, restoration and archiving, it formally belongs to the India Photo Archive Foundation. (Image: Aditya Arya in the lobby of Museo)

During my last visit to India in late 2022, most of the time I was unwell and bed-ridden. The highlight of this stay was a visit to Museo during which I had a brief encounter with Aditya.

This visit to Museo was also an opportunity to visit and on-going art exhibition organised by Oxygen Art Guild and curated by Tarun Das. I was lucky to meet and speak to Tarun as well.

Thus, this post is about both Museo Camera Museum and the Oxygen Art Guild exhibition. I am not going to repeat the information about the backgrounds of Museo museum, Aditya Arya and Oxygen Art Guild , you can check those on their respective websites. This post is mostly about the things which had especially struck me during this visit. Before I start, I would also like to recommend you to check the different old-pics collections at the Aditya Arya Photo Archives website.

Museo Location

Museo is located off a small road in front of the Galleria market (DLF phase 3, Nathupur) in downtown Gurgaon. The nearest Delhi Metro stations are IFFCO Chowk and HUDA City Centre, from where you can take an auto or a cab to reach Museo. It has sufficient parking space but its location on a narrow and busy road can be tricky to navigate.

If you are visiting Gurgaon and are wondering about places to visit, do visit and spend some time in Museo.

Museo Activities

Museo is a vibrant cultural space with some permanent exhibitions and areas for temporary exhibitions. Photography is encouraged in all the museum spaces.

For example, it has weekend classes on photography (and other cultural activities such as dance classes) including the one year photography diploma course as well as different workshops (when I visited, there were posters of workshops about cyanotype, film and analog photography, salt print process, environmental portraits by Sundeep Bali and street photography).

There were also some on-going exhibitions, about which I have written below and there was a live music performance by Ruchika and Deepak Castelino. The ground floor of the museo building has the camera museum while upstairs are the different exhibition and workshop spaces.

Camera Installations

There were some installations made out of old cameras or in which cameras played a significant role scattered around in the building.

One striking installation was the "Hug Me" man by the well known Gurgaon artist Gopal Namjoshi made from junk metal and old analog cameras. Namjoshi is known for his monumental installations in which often junk metals play an important role.

Another installation which I liked, had a mannequin surrounded by all kinds of carrying bags for the old analog cameras. (Image below has the 2 installations - the Hug Me man and the camera-bags)

The third camera installation which particularly struck me was the inverted pyramid handing above the central gallery. There were also some big old cameras from early 20th century.

Temporary Exhibitions

Among the temporary exhibitions, I especially loved "Nirvasanama", which documented the life in exile of Dev Shumsher (1862-1914), the "liberal" Prime Minister of Nepal, who was exiled in India in early 20th century.

Colours of Convergence

In the art exhibition "Colours of Convergence" organised by Oxygen Art Guild and curated by Tarun Das I liked the works of -  watercolors by Sudhangsu Bandopadhyay, woodcut on paper by Jintu Mohan Kalita, oil painting by Aniruddha Mukherjee, acrylic on canvas by Apurba Karati and very especially the Cityscapes of cows by Jiban Biswas.

Last year, I had met Valeria Bertesina, an artist who curates the Paper Art Biennale in Schio and that had been my introduction to understanding the meaning of "curating art exhibitions". In Museo, I had an opportunity to talk to Tarun Das (in the image below), who had curated the exhibition "Colours of Convergence", which was another opportunity to reflect on the different ways in which individuals can "curate" exhibitions, imprinting it with their dialogues with the artists in selecting and deciding what gets exhibited and how.

 

Vintage Analogic World

As we go deeper into the digital world, it is not just analog cameras and photographic prints which are disappearing but the whole world is changing. This nostalgia for the disappearing world is represented in Museo by a painted ambassador car, an old lambretta scooter, a biscope and a colourful three-wheeler.

Sculptures in Museo

There are  also a few sculptures scattered in the open area surrounding the Museo, which are worth looking at. These include 2 sculptures of boys reading a book.

In the End

Except for the malls, which have a primary commercial purpose, Gurgaon has only a few cultural spaces. Another such local cultural space is the Sanskriti Museum.

I hope that the next time you are in Gurgaon and are wondering about places to visit and things to do, you can visit the Museo Camera Museum!