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BIOGRAPHY The Graphic Artist, Gérard Vachez, is a native of France. He was born in Brittany in 1961. His strong desire to study art led him to a Degree in Plastic Arts & Graphic Design in 1984. Through his educational training he gained expertise in the traditions of painting, sculpture, photography. A customary painting exhibition was his first experience with the public at the end of his studying years.
Africa also inspired the young artist as a Photographer. Gathering his most beautiful photographs taken locally, he held his first exhibition of Black & White photographs, first in Burundi, then in Rwanda and then Zaïre. His experiences in Africa lasted until 1986 when Gérard returned to France, to settle in Paris .
Back in France, he was up to try out new photographic technics. His evolution built along several series of different styles, mostly a mix of paint and pictures. He also worked a lot on mastering the effects of light and shadows. This whole elaboration and the results were shown year after year in Art Magazines such as : “Collector Magazine”, “Traits”, “Vis a Vis International” etc...
In 1995, Gérard was to take a radical turn and change his whole future when he made the decision to listen to the crazy craving of the Carribean and eventualy move to Guadeloupe Island. He then started a filial of his Parisian company in this new French West Indies location. In the year 1998 he was ripe for a new exhibition of his last pictures, another successful venture, depicted in FWI magazines and a TV show.
In 1999, thanks to Michael’s help, he settled in Miami, opened his latest Company: Xposure Advertising. His numerous paintings and pictures has been seen ever since in magazines such as “Ocean Drive”, “Gotham”, “Vogue” etc ... IMAGINARY MAZE OF THE BARRE SUBSTANCE is his first painting and photograph exhibit in Miami.
PAINTING - PHOTOGRAPHY
PAINTING These paintings were design to be screened during a special event organized by the faculty of the Sorbonne in Paris. Instead of photographing painted canvases, I chose to create the whole thing on a slide in order to be more of an innovator and cast a more interesting approach to the project. So, I used clear Rodoid Plastic and then mixed a lot of different materials and medias on it.
After my first tests with some Ecolines (water colors), I began to tamper with the media: scratching it, cutting and gluing it back together to create several levels. For this matter, I used different types of glue, each reacting in a different way to the heat of the slide projector, for example, when left long enough inside the machine, some slides would begin to crack slowly, getting the looks of an old varnished painting.
PHOTOGRAPHY All to often, pictures are only interesting because of their subjects, but not thanks to their technique (light, colors, shadows...). Therefore, they drift apart from the whole creativity of the painting concept. It’s very easy to take a pretty good picture with a good camera, but is the picture creative? Not necessarily.
I so decided to rediscover the creativity linked to the painting act, and not only satisfying myself with a nice cliché. I wanted the results to look as good as a painting but without using any computerized techniques.
To achieve my goal, I mixed lights and paints during the shooting : using a pane of glass on a special frame allowed me to write, draw even paint on this clear support. My model was then installed behind the glass altered both by the writing and the light passing through the colors of the paint. For a special picture series, I also chose to color the model with coal powder and pastels.
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