Back in the late ’80s, while working in an animation studio, I kept a lead sharpener with me. For no particular reason, I began collecting the graphite powder that gathered inside it. Years later, I discovered that by mixing it with varnish, I could create a uniquely luminous paint — and that’s how this series was born.
I started painting on matte black canvases with my graphite mix, developing a style that blended automatic drawing and painterly technique — intuitive, spontaneous, and free. No planning, no overthinking — just letting the lines speak for themselves.
These works were created between 2008 and 2014 — painted at the Centre Pompidou during the Peinture Fraîche show, in my Montreuil studio and later in my first studio in Los Angeles.