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French artist, born in Melun in 1960.
Philippe Bouveret is fascinated by the world of inventions. As a child, he was curious about electricity and the telephone, and carried out all kinds of little experiments. Between the ages of 13 and 18, with much patience, perseverance and ingenuity he built a real boat, 6 m long. This was the great achievement of his early years.
He planned to become a naval architect and took his technical baccalaureate.
At the same time, he discovered contemporary art and realised that by becoming an artist, he would be free to develop his passion for experiments. At the age of 21 he entered the …cole Nationale des Beaux Arts (National School of Fine Arts) in Paris. There, the very conventional teaching was not really what he had hoped for:
he gave up this training and having come into contact with Pol Bury, became his pupil. Inspired by his master, he developed his own artistic work based around research into movement. He was interested to discover a number of kinetic artists, in particular Takis, and made the acquaintance of Nicolas Schˆffer, whose work he greatly admired.
In 1987, Philippe Bouveret had another significant encounter, with Jean Tinguely. With his wife DorothÈe, he helped in the construction of Cyclops, Jean Tinguely's monumental sculpture hidden away in the forest of Milly (Essonne). Jean Tinguely encouraged Philippe Bouveret in his work and lent him a workshop in Dannemois. Cyclops is now the setting for two works by Philippe Bouveret.
In general, Philippe Bouveret's work revolves around two constant themes: movement and water. Indirectly, he had already worked on the theme of water during his childhood, by building his boat. At the beginning of the 1980s he met John Wilkes, an anthroposophist, who was working on a system of fountains for purifying water. He was fascinated by this man, whose whole life revolved around one passion, water.
Philippe Bouveret's sculptures – fountains, pointers, secret tableaux and pendulums – come to life under the influence of natural forces such as atmospheric pressure, heat, evaporation, expansion, etc. The movement induced in his works is slow, calm, silent and random. His creative work revolves around the pleasures of discovery, invention and the game played with the visitor. There is humour to his work. What he does is precise and closely controlled. It demonstrates a heightened awareness of the precarious equilibrium of the world, inviting us to be aware of the forces surrounding us and to take account of the fragility of our environment.
Philippe Bouveret explains: “I work in my laboratory-studio, accidentally making little discoveries that arouse my curiosity. I often turn my works into games so that the visitor, who becomes a player, is aware of the perverse and powerful forces of nature, thereby reminding him that it is he who must adapt to nature and that he is constantly subject to it."
Virginie COSTECALDE
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Les Expositions / Exhibitions Expositions personnelles |
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Expositions de groupe (sélection) Réalisations monumentales |
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