Fondation Thalie is pleased to present its first artistic collaboration under the aegis of Editions Thalie and invites you to discover a jewelry edition of the artist Lionel Estève.
In mythology, the god Morpheus is often represented as a young man holding a mirror in his hand and some poppy with soporific powers. He has colorful and exuberant butterfly wings and offers a sleep just by touching someone with its poppies.
” I thought that this plant bloomed only in Orient, on the foothills of the Himalaya or in Turkey and I was surprised to discover some of them on a path in the Provençal countryside. This pale rose poppy flower has slightly purplish color and blooms in just one week, letting then the space to a bulb with a little crown. Contemplating it was for me a way to meet mythology. This wonderful flower of delicate colors appears to me as ambivalent, simultaneously full of sun and summer fragrance but also carrying darkness, dangerous and forbidden, because its sap is opium. I had to pay a tribute to it. Since then, every year, I harvest its capsule to gild it with gold leaves and create miniature sculptures. With this gesture, I want to pay a tribute to these poppy seeds and to their grandeur. A manner to illustrate how this flower has been isolated in the Antiquity and how, despite its fragility, it possesses a frightening power. I produced a pendant in 30 exemplaries from these sculptures. I am delighted to present you today this singular and exclusive edition.” — Lionel Estève
Lionel Estève was born in 1967 in Lyon, France. He works and lives in Brussels, Belgium. His work is situated at the crossroads of drawing, sculpture and installation. The informal and fragility that characterize his work awake our perception of an infinite reality and unveil a tangible, almost sensitive space. His work plays on space, colors and sensorial perception. His works recalls the interest of the artist for creative energies and their grasping. Handworker, seeker, Lionel Estève deploys matters, lines, colors within the perceptible and the imperceptible: “I perceive my works as mental. I hope they live the same way in the mind of the public. I don’t expect them to understand, but to air their spirit.”
Lionel Estève is represented by Galerie Perrotin, Paris, and Galerie Baronian Xippas, Brussels.
Morphée
Pendant signed by Lionel Estève
Lost wax Poppy & bronze
Limited Edition of 50 copies and 3 artist proof
Price: 450 euros