PHILIPPE PASQUA

Opera Gallery London is pleased to present an exhibition of original artworks by the passionate
and fascinating self-taught French artist Philippe Pasqua.

Born in 1965, he has dedicated his life to painting, drawing and sculpture since the early 1990s
and has since gained recognition as one of the most significant artists of his generation.
Recently he has been exhibited in International Museums, Art Foundations and International
art fairs.

Only a mere portion of Pasquas work is usually exposed to the general public and even the
art connoisseurs. Therefore through this exhibition we intend to provide a broader and more
complete insight into his art. The show will include Pasquas signature large palimpsests and
provocative nudes, as well as sensual up close and personal portraits, also introducing a
rare tattooed vanitas and skull sculptures.

Sometimes referred to as the French Francis Bacon, Philippe Pasquas art has also been
compared to that of Lucien Freud and Jenny Saville - undoubtedly due to their unwavering
carnal aspect - and his sculptures to those of Damien Hirsts. Intrinsically, his turbulent and
singular style, described by Pierre Restany as spontaneous realism, lies in an obsession most
evident in his skulls; to getting beneath the skin of the model, capturing deep into their souls
as it flies away.

The result is, as the Art critic David Rosenberg once wrote, an exceptionally violent physical
shock (), a vision of surgical precision. Pasqua does not represent skin, he says, but flesh.

We hope your journey through Philippe Pasquas carnal universe will bring you deep beyond the
skin of humanity and, through that, a bit closer to your own soul.

Gilles Dyan
FOUNDER AND Chairman
OPERA GALLERY GROUP

JeaN-David Malat
DIRECTOR
OPERA GALLERY LONDON

Untitled - Mixed media on paper laid down on canvas - 200 x 150 cm - 78.7 x 59.1 in.

Untitled - Mixed media on paper laid down on canvas - 200 x 150 cm - 78.7 x 59.1 in.

Untitled - Mixed media on paper laid down on canvas - 200 x 150 cm - 78.7 x 59.1 in.

Truly, everything within us is vanity, except the honest

confession before God of ones vanity. For 17th Century
French philosopher Jacques-Bnigne Bossuet, such honest
confessions were the very cornerstones of faith. Philippe
Pasquas confessions are artistic. And this artists work
supersedes the vain and the valuable.

Philippe PASQUA
by cynthia fleury

As

with

Roland

Barthes

Mythologies,

Pasqua

has

an

innate sense of how to debunk and celebrate todays

icons. Consider his tattooed Ferrari: mechanics as sensual
as soft skin. A modern Maori tribal totem. A delirious take on
the intense, born in the artists subconscious irony, playful
and lustful. But Pasqua doesnt settle on the merely delirious.
He creates. And this particular creation, a prize that many
international firms would love to possess, is suspended
sideways, vertically enthroned on an imaginary road.

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Its also a quasi-spiritual attempt to epitomize the pretentious.

Skulls have been decorated with butterflies: black skulls,
crimson skulls, glowing mother-of-pearl skulls, even tattooed
skulls reflecting off each other in what seems to be a game of
mirrors. Somewhere between Ecclesiastes and THE Lady from
Shanghai, between the beginning of time and the dawning of
Hollywood; an artistic urge connecting eternitys ephemeral
dots. Those who are familiar with Philippe Pasquas work
will understand the use of a shrunken Jivaro skull and have
already pondered his more monumental works of butterflies
glued together to form a magic sky so blue so drenched
in sunlight
These vanities further represent the meeting of the civilized
and the savage: a major theme throughout his work. The
artist now seems to focus on animal skulls that have been
tattooed, lacquered, encrusted magnified to the point of
consecration.

From

human

vanity

to

the

animal

The

arrogance of the living; their glorification as well.

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And then there are the portraits. Faces have always been
important in Philippe Pasquas work: faces and bodies as the
ubiquitous components of his personal pantheon. A holy
house of heroes, their bodies dislocated and dismembered.
Dionysus in the absence of Apollo. In the kingdom of art,
the invalid rules. And nowadays, quite naturally and
spiritually it has become the blind. In the past, Pasquas
walls were decorated with those suffering from Downs
syndrome; the anesthetized. In the past, his transvestites
and other social outcasts flirted with his more socially
acceptable and happy subjects.
Now, men with eyes destroyed remind us that Tiresias is
alive and well and predicting the future. Tiresias, the
blind sight-seer, with his infinite knowledge of mankind;
predicting the future but never condemning it. The former,
dismembered body has been replaced by a new bruised
and battered body. The Ferrari is replaced by another
machine; the revved up combo of man and wheelchair.

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Marble tattooed skull - Carrara white marble tattooed, unique piece - H: 60 cm - 23.6 in.

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Always these machines, like the bodies, playing a specific

role on Pasquas artistic path. We ARE REMINDED OF cold blue
operating rooms; theIR awe-inspiring technical frostiness.
This now has morphed into wheelchair metal clanking on
canvas. The busts and faces of the victims as always
have

been

sublimed.

Because

beyond

mere

skulls

and shrunken heads, the same gesture, the same genius

dominates: that of a creator possessed by the beautiful; the
magnificently beautiful Magnificently beautiful and bruised.

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Marble ashtray - Carrara white marble, unique piece - 50 cm 19.7 in.

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The elusive Philippe Pasqua

Solo exhibitions

Throughout an extraordinary path, Philippe Pasqua has earned recognition as one of the most important artists

1990 Espace Confluences, Paris, France

2004 Mtamorphoses (Metamorphoses), Galerie RX, Paris, France

of his generation. From the very beginning, his art impressed and knocked down the convictions of whoever ran

1991 Galerie Woo Mang et Partners, Paris, France

2005 Centre Culturel, Metz, France

alongside him such as the famous art critic Pierre Restany.

1995 Chteau de Grouchy, Osny, France

2006 P
 atrick Painter Gallery, Santa Monica, California, USA

Espace Dautzenberg, Brussels, Belgium

Pasquas taste for monumental sized artworks is coupled with a fascination for the most vulnerable things in life:

The International Center, Detroit, Michigan, USA

Spike Gallery, New York, USA

2007 Philippe Pasqua - Pulsion, Galerie RX and Galerie Enrico Navarra, Paris, France

the humans bodies and faces. Sometimes, he paints them with stigmatising differences that he magnifies through

1996 Galerie Boulakia, Paris, France

his art: portraits of blind people, transsexuals, and even people with Down syndrome Disabilities, differences,

1998 Yvonamor Palix, Mexico City, Mexico

by Peter Lipke

1999 G
 alerie Lucien Durand, Paris, France

Crne (Skull), Artcurial, Paris, France

obscenity and the sacred are some of his favourite topics. Through them, every canvas is the result of a fight
between what can be shown and tolerated and what is socially unacceptable or repressed.
Pasquas painting results in a physical shock portraying an explosive and sharp vision. The profusion and
amplitude of the painters artistic gesture demands for monumental sized canvases. Pasqua starts his paintings by
depicting what we could refer to as fetishes, or enigmatic figures that are reminiscent of voodoo. Then, little by little,
he turns his eye to those who surround the figures; he penetrates into the deepest of their intimacy.
Beside the carnal work, Pasqua is well-known for his large drawings. In these, he makes the human face or the

La Machine eau (The Water machine), Mons Center for Contemporary

Art, Mons, Belgium

2009 P
 hilippe Pasqua, Stiftung Ahlers Pro Arte, Hannover, Germany, organised

Crne (Skull), Isola di San Servolo, Venice, Italy

2010 P
 hilippe Pasqua, Palimpsestes, uvres sur papier (Palimpsests, works on

2001 Trauma, Galerie Hengevoss-Duerkop-Jensen, Hamburg, Germany

paper), Galerie Laurent Strouk, Paris, France

2002 Les

Miroirs de lme (Mirrors of the soul) - Portraits 1989-2001, Palais

Philippe Pasqua, Peintures et dessins (Paintings and drawings), Moscow, Russia

Bndictine, Fcamp, France, organised with Erick Oge

Bloc portrait, Galerie Hengevoss-Duerkop, Hamburg, Germany
2003 Galerie

Hengevoss-Duerkop-Jensen, Hamburg, Germany
Lucille, Galerie RX, Paris, France

Museum of Modern Art, Moscow, Russia, organised by Marc Ivalevitch and

David Rosenberg, partnered with Galerie RX
2011 P
 hilippe Pasqua, Art Paris 2011, Grand Palais, Galerie Laurent Strouk, Paris,
France

body into some halo, mist, smoke, line or even no more than a vibration. They are no longer flesh and living matter,
but rather sketched outlines and delicate textures. One must also mention the palimpsests: works on paper that
result from the combination of serigraphic techniques, printing and paint, on which the painter remakes his pieces
until reaching satisfaction through, adding colours or redesigning parts.

GROUP exhibitions

Another major aspect of Philippe Pasquas work is his series of vanitas. The technique he uses evokes a silvers-

1990 Maison des Arts, Beausset, France

mith from the Middle Age working on a reliquary as well as shaman performing a ritual: he covers human skulls with

1992 S
 alon des Grands et Jeunes daujourdhui (Nowadays Great and Young

leaves of silver or gold. Sometimes he covers them with skin and gets them tattooed. Finally comes the complex
and delicate process of ornamenting the skulls with naturalized butterflies, which either diffuse light and powder
colours through their wings or get lost in the shadows of the skulls eye-sockets. At times, Pasqua pours thick
paint on top of the whole thing to submerge it.

Art Fair), Paris, France

1994 Aides

Association, Espace Cardin, Paris, France
Chaussures dartistes (Artists shoes), Joan Mir Foundation, Barcelona, Spain
1997 3
 Visions de lArt contemporain franais (Three views on French contemporary
art), Galerie Martini, Hong Kong

For a few years, the artist has been going to Carrara frequently in order to sculpt skulls weighing several tons and
that look like gigantic stars radiating with telluric force. At the foundry, he creates impressive cast-iron bronzes that
are plunged into chrome: whether they are human or animal (he once made a hippo vanitas), the skulls that come
out of this bath look just like mirrors. As such, they sometimes reflect a blinding brightness, and other times disappear completely to donate the entirety surface to whatever is reflected in them. And as soon as one steps closer,
inevitably, it is their own image that they face.

1998 8
 0 artistes autour du Mondial (80 artists around the World Cup), Galerie
Enrico Navarra, Paris, France (with Jeff Koons, Rotella, Csar, Matta,
Clemente, Nam June Paik among others)

organised by Jean-Michel Ribettes

Collages dhier et daujourdhui (Collages from yesterday and from today),
Galerie Lucien Durand - Le Gaillard, Paris, France
2001 Face Off, Aeroplastics Damasquine Gallery, Brussels, Belgium
2002 Inauguration (Launch), Galerie RX, Paris, France
2004 B
 eyond Paradise, Galerie RX, Paris, France
Artistes contemporains des galeries du 8e arrondissement (Contemporary
artists from the galleries in Paris 8th arrondissement), Paris, France
2005 Q
 uintessence (Quintessence), Galerie RX, Paris, France

Hygine (Hygiene), Yvonamor Palix, Mexico City, Mexico (with Orlan, Aziz +

Au-del du corps (Beyond the body), Biennale dArt Contemporain,

Cucher, Sandy Skoglund, Steve Miller)

Aixe-sur-Vienne, France

Hygine (Hygiene), Fondation La Source, La Guroulde, France

A3, Place Saint-Sulpice, Paris, France, organised by Sophie Actis

Ahrenberg Collection: 50 ans dhistoire de lart (50 years of Art History),

2006 Soutine and Modern Art, Cheim and Read Gallery, New York, USA

Fine Art Museum, Mons, Belgium, organised by Erick Oge

2010 N
 ew Era, Galerie RX, Paris, France

1999 F
 tiches, ftichismes (Fetishes, fetishisms), Passage de Retz, Paris,

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2000 N
 arcisse bless (Narcisse wounded), Passage de Retz, Paris, France,

Cest la vie ! Vanits de Caravage Damien Hirst (Its life! Vanitas from

France, organised by Jean-Michel Ribettes

Caravage to Damien Hirst), organised by Patrizia Nitti, Artistic Director for

Nao & Friends, Espace Via, Paris, France

the Maillol Museum, Claudio Strinati, General Director

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134, New Bond Street London W1S 2TF

(T) +44 (0)207 491 2999 london@operagallery.com www.operagallery.com

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