BERNARD DUMAINE, France ❧

"BernardaviD"

Have you been an artist all your life? When did you realise this was your path, how old were you?

Bernard: I have been drawing since a very young age, but I never considered myself as an artist. To draw was important for me, though. I was about 20 years old when I was sure I needed art as my main activity.

Do you believe in a proper "training" for art and that it is important or necessary for an artist to go through an educational institution focusing on the art for him to become an accomplished or better artist?

Bernard: I can't tell for everyone, each case is obviously different. Some masters never had art classes - Francis Bacon, for instance. Did Gérome Bosch had some?

Whatsoever, I enjoyed my educational art classes a lot. It was in a local but nice Fine Art School due to the quality of the teachers. I had a lot of freedom for three years (I really need freedom to create) which I spent mainly drawing and drawing again.

Maybe the most important thing the teachers taught us there was for us to focus on inspiration, not technical skills. Both were very important for me. That reminds me of an interview of Francis Bacon once again, where he said too many painters were confusing "Painting" and "illustration" ...


You started in your early years with classic art, painting and drawing, who were your influences then and why did you feel inspired by them?

Bernard: Yes, I had some art classes at the age of 11 until 15, an afternoon a week, drawing or painting still lifes, just learning, no influences so to say. At the same age, I was reading a lot of comics, my own drawings were mostly influenced by these "books" rather than old masters. I did some females portraits at the age of 15, from photographs, without knowing about Hyperealism at the time. I remember also of a copy that I did of a fantastic soldier’s head by Léonard de Vinci. Laterly, I saw an exhibition of huge hyperealistic paintings by French painter Jacques Damville. His works were scenes of the ordinary life, his mother cleaning plates, a farm, ruined cars in the countryside, his brother, who was a butcher, at work … I was very impressed and it made me start some urban landscapes and portraits from photographs and colour slides …


Later, you progressed into Surrealism and digital art, how did you feel about the transition, and what inspired you to change or experiment with new style and techniques?

Bernard: I learnt a lot about the different artistic periods during the art history classes (that’s another good point about the educational art institution). I was very interested in fantastic art, surrealism and hyperealism and I was reading a lot of books on Surrealism, always looking for pictures of painters from this movement.

I admire very much the drawings of Gérard Titus-Carmel and Surrealist masters as well.

In the year of 1999, I discovered both the internet and graphical softwares. I enjoyed my first experiments tremendously as they were very close to some earlier drawings I did, and the computer softwares were really fast for creating works!!! I immediately understood the fantastic power of the Net and its ability to share my works worlwide.


Do you feel that working on a painting is more difficult than working on digital art? Where does the difficulty lie in the work you create?

I think each technical medium produces its own inspiration – difference between drawing and engraving for instance – the process of each medium influences the final result of the work.

For me, digital art is faster to realise and quite to achieve results than real painting. I have painted in oils from digital using a print of the digital sketch as reference. The time I spent on the work was one week or so for digital, and months for the painting on canvas.

The negative point with digital, in my opinion, is the process of rapid reproduction as this can lead to quantity instead of quality.

Please indicate four of your work and the ones that have the most meaning to you, and let us know a) what inspire you with the piece, b) how difficult was it to create, the process of preparing your vision until the actual execution; c) what message did you want to deliver, and d) what excites or touches you about the piece?


Difficult to tell, but first, I would say a painting from 1980 "On irait" (We should go) which was done copying and resizing in a larger format a collage sketch.  I particularly like this painting because it was a mix of surrealism and hyperrealism as the painting was a close copy of the collage.

Secondly, a painting from 1999, "Doigt" (Finger) in which I used the same process, but utilizing there a digital imaging software for the making of the sketch (the title comes from the last digital tool I used when making it).


Thirdly, my series of drawings and paintings "Le fond et la forme" using sometimes tiny and aleatory "sculptures" of modelling paste as models. The French title refers to a literary mode, but is more a joke concerning "the meaning and the look".



And finally, the "Exquisite Corpse" series which I did with a lot of international artists, each executed once again in traditional or digital mediums.

I enjoy making these a lot, a very exciting moment being when the half cover is removed to show the completed piece !!!

Without the possibilities of the Internet, the contacts necessary to produce such collaborative works with international artists would have been impossible some years ago.

And it’s a nice mix of new and old technologies because finally the drawings were sent by postage service!


Your painting series, the "Magical Mystery Tool", please explain the inspiration, the concept, and the message you want to deliver.

Bernard: This series started from sketches with ink on paper back in 1995. I modelled and coloured some in the year of 2000 with my computer tools. Once printed, I enlarged and painted them with oil on canvas.

With the series, I wanted to make "trompe l’œil" objects, but without existing models – no sticks nor threads were harmed in the making of my ink drawings, haha!

The title is a pun from The Beatles’ song "Magical Mystery Tour".

In these works, and in many other works of mine as well, a part of my goal is to paint with good technical skills humble objects, people or scenes, and not the contrary, I mean, beautiful models badly painted.

I must add there is so much serendipities involved in these works that I feel like any other person watching them, I am unable to tell much about the meaning(s).


You are French, do you feel that there are a great number of talented artists in France? How do you feel your place in that world?

Bernard: Well, there is certainly the same percentage of talents here than everywhere in the world … I just feel I am not an "avant-guarde" artist, but I do not care about that.

You have started exhibiting outside of France, what made you consider going international with your work?

Bernard: Once again, the Internet helped a lot with this, these exhibitions were and will be made after some encounters over the net.

What direction do you feel Art is going these days? Is there a difference in trend in Europe and say, the U.S.?

Bernard: If your question concerns Surrealism, I would say there is no difference in trend, haha!

It’s difficult to give a global answer to this question, the main difference between contempory art and art of the past centuries, is the burst of Art in plenty of different movements at the same time - land art, various abstracts and realistic tendancies, body art, conceptual art, and so on … and more and more art involved in new technologies.  Some critics even say there is now one art per artist!  I can't see major differences between trends in both continents.


Are you working on a project at the moment or planning one?

Bernard: I am currently having a local group exhibition, and I will exhibit some digital prints in an International group show in Spencer, Iowa, on August of 2006.

==> BERNARD DUMAINE