Jean-Michel Othoniel

JEAN-MICHEL OTHONIEL (Saint-Étienne, France, 1964)
Untitled.
Sculpture in sulfur and waxes.
Without signature.
Measurements: 31 x 12 x 12 x 12 cm; 37 x 12 x 12 x 12 cm (with base).

This work is a powerful piece because of the tension between its form (a strong fist) and its materiality (fragile sulfur and wax), inviting a reflection on beauty, vulnerability and time. Stylistically, it is situated at the intersection between abstract figuration and material exploration. Sulfur (a material with alchemical, volcanic and even religious connotations) gives the piece its distinctive pale yellow color. The work can be interpreted as a meditation on the human gesture and the fragility of matter.

Jean-Michel Othoniel has developed his sculptural career mainly in Paris, where he lives. He graduated from the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts de Cergy-Pontoise in 1988 and began his exhibition career shortly after, in the early 1990s. In 1992 he participated in the Documenta in Cassel. From the beginning of his career he showed a great interest in experimenting with materials, in investigating their properties, looking for materials and techniques that would allow him to experiment with metamorphosis, sublimations, transmutations. From 1992, for example, he became keenly interested in obsidian, the natural glass of volcanic origin, and began experimenting with glass, cooperating with CIRVA (Centre International de recherche sur le verre et les arts plastiques). Along with sculpture in glass and other materials, he has also worked with installations (including for example video or projections) and happening. His exhibitions include his participation in Feminin/Masculin, in 1994, at the Centre Pompidou, Crystal Palace; at the Fondation Cartier, in 2003; his installation in the rooms dedicated to Mesopotamian art at the Louvre, as part of the exhibition Contrepoint; in Art Unlimited 2005 and many others. Among his most spectacular installations can be cited Peggy's Necklace, a monumental blue glass necklace on the facade of the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice in 2006, or three sculptures entitled Les Belles Danses, in the fountains of the gardens of the Palace of Versailles. His work is kept in important museums such as the Centre Pompidou in Paris, the Musée d'art contemporain de Hara in Tokyo, the Macao Museum of Art or the Brooklyn Museum in New York.