The relationship with nature has been at the heart of Sébastien Grenier’s artistic work for more than fifteen years. His research leads him to apprehend the raw nature as a form of incarnate truth, plural, a set of forces. Experiencing the landscape, the elements that make it up, is preponderant and is part of an initiatory journey. All of his work is characterized by a certain attraction for origins, the primitive, but also reflects the impermanence of things, their constant mutations, the mysterious organization of chaos. The absence of human presence, familiar objects or architectural elements, the loss of reference points of scale, perspective or temporality lead to a total immersion and a direct reconnection, free from the prism of culture, to matter and living things. In this way, it testifies to a desire to restore nature to our sight, our memory, this intimate and collective memory, which underpins and connects us. Using painting, photography, mixed techniques, digital experiments, collages, Sébastien Grenier has developed a unique writing style. His work is also divided between immersion in the heart of nature and fitness in the workshop or darkroom. After more than forty years spent in the major cities of Paris, Nantes and Bordeaux, he opened his studio in 2013 in the small village of St Antonin Noble Val in the heart of the Aveyron gorges.
Read Sébastien Grenier’s interview on the blog
