Xavier De Maisonneuve

A graduate of the Estienne school and Fine Arts, Xavier de Maisonneuve lives and works in Saint Gilles Croix de Vie. He devoted himself to photography from his adolescence, at the time of the great photo reporters (Magnum, Le Monde). Sensitive to narrative figuration, he readily recognizes himself in the quotation of one of the founding members of the movement, Peter Klasen, who declares "I am a painter, because I am a photographer".

Lover of Nature, he tries to understand the meaning of our blindness and our inaction concerning what we consider to be “ad vitam aeternam": Life in all its forms.

The artist is literally called by the image. He speaks of "What happens" in the phenomenon of capture. Like this magnificent weeping willow reflected in a pond, an innocuous complement. But he follows a fixed idea: what if the trees spoke, what if nature spoke? Thus, with this same image of a weeping willow, he produced two works: "the climate skeptic loves beautiful landscapes!" "And" Rabbit ".

Xavier de Maisonneuve tries to create a dialogue between all of his works in a permanent interconnection. We talk about progress, sustainable trade, collapsology, rising waters, glyphosate, plastic too. So many things that move him and question me.

His research on the alienation of contemporary life gives rise to sensitive, funny and disturbing works that participate in a global reflection on our behavior and the place we occupy in our environment.

In these recent works, the painting becomes writing, vibrant in an unrepentant gesture, which makes it enter a form of frenzy, raising the question of access to nature.