Jean-Paul Boyer is a self-taught sculptor who trained during internships with sculptors and took courses at La Grande Chaumière. As far back as he can remember, he says he has always cut, modified, arranged differently the materials that were accessible to him: wood, clay, plaster and later metal and stone.
It is only as a young adult that he really becomes aware of this capacity and necessity of creation that will not leave him despite the necessity to work on something else. However, in spite of his years of achievements, the space he creates by removing or adding material is no longer enough for him. He then seeks how to "work" the air, the emptiness that surrounds the material of the sculpture. To be quick, the solution appears to him brutally, as an obviousness with the idea of almost all the sculptures to come...
His new sculptures are not fixed once and for all. Modular by the spectator, they are partitions of space that he offers to the spectator, to the collector. Anyone is free to express his sensitivity, his emotion, his vision of space, sometimes even his opposition. But even if someone totally destructured the sculpture, making it "illegible" at first sight, if the announced project is to destructure, it will still remain a "sculpture", a creative gesture, whatever its aesthetic value.
Reorganizing the elements of the sculpture means of course modifying the whole piece, and therefore the way we look at it. It is first of all to modify its expression, by putting a little bit of oneself into it. Whatever the new aspect given, one always has the possibility of finding the original work, at any time and quickly. Changing the image of the sculpture is also a gesture that engages and therefore makes the person who does it responsible: it shows something of himself that he transmits to the next spectator, who in turn accepts or modifies it. The spectator is no longer simply "watching". He has become an actor. Jean-Paul Boyer wrote the score and the spectator becomes his interpreter.
Of course the work must be accessible, left within reach of spectators who would like to change its appearance, to look for new avatars, to invent their own vision of the space occupied by the material in front of them. The playful side that can sometimes be given by manipulating the structure is not the goal. It is a consequence which, sometimes, is very interesting.
The number of combinations for a single work, if it is limited, is considerable. He often advises his collectors to take pictures of their works before moving on to new ones...
