Raymond Douillet – Featured Artist
birds
the woman sits upon the earth as if it were hers swaying the magical elephant with her spidering fingers star-crossing reverberant paths with the other adjoining musicians sitting in from neighboring quantum galaxies each planet in the grand orchestra is designated to a specific player responsible for a particular role the stray dissonance of their intersection resonates between galaxies and throughout the temple of the earth which is architected in perfectly sculpted geometrical shapes a giant crow leaps from the piano— it is the piano! spindling frequencies like harpoons into the anthropomorphic birds that dance nude around the temple like tribal shadow puppets juggling spherical foundations of universal matter between rhythm and whim —exit scene— the band continues to play some members pass on new ones join old ones rejoin but the music never stops until it does and then without any rhyme or reason starts again —enter new scene— a skull buries in the sand dividing the hourglass between night and day which draws much attention to the exhumation of human activity the man sits upon the statue his head becomes a piano the two make love at the base of the skull a baby is found in a tree —exit scene— the brief embryonic tissue envelops everything is opaque before it becomes itself —enter new scene— a funeral pyre is lost in space displaced in the far reaches of some other quantum galaxy the reaper is dressed only in black lingerie casting its spell ordaining the clock to deaden at midnight we have seen its skull and know it to be the face of the reaper the window is a mirror to space and the woman stripped to the stars in swanlike distress is undressed and pure the ghosts are aroused they know they cannot be seen this arouses them more every crow reminds the moon there is still light it stands upon the skeletal head of the reaper the caw signifies death death signifies life the birth of the sun and four and a half billion years the crescent smile is a reminder there is still time not much but enough for experience enough to join hands before the shadow gods eat the rest we tend to forget the reaper is living too though objected from doing so but as for her life could not continue she's sung with the birds flapped her wings loosened her feathers her journey will not be remembered or forgotten existing was never intended for perennial palpability there are no remaining postures of identifying demonstratives no relativity or importance in the general conveyance of conduct that demands but never needed immediate action or attention you were just there one moment and the other you were not —exit scene— the crypt is chained shut at least for this moment the clock smiles the piano marches until its next march which whistles in a final successor the romancer finds himself aroused in the night the two make love and join together in a new tree the world or some idea of such starts over again imperfect and soon forgotten by LORIN DREXLER
Raymond Douillet
www.angelakinggallery.com/raymond-douillet
Hautmont, France
Raymond Douillet was born on July 20th, 1947 — on the very day of the Tour de France cycle race arrival — in Hautmont, in the North of France. This small town is separated from Maubeuge by a river, the Sambre. Maubeuge is Jan Gossaert’s, also named Jean de Mabuse (c 1478-1532), native town. He introduced the spirit and shapes of the Italian Renaissance into Northern Gothic Art through Dürer’s decisive influence. Almost four centuries and a half later, Raymond Douillet, unaware of it at the beginning, followed his prestigious predecessors’ footsteps. This could be called, owing to André Breton’s phrase, an « objective coincidence »: from one painter to the other, this relationship, which was fortuitous at the beginning, is now shared within a space configuration that has more than one thing in common. Everything works out as if Mabuse’s formula found an echo in Raymond’s paintings, a set up « mirrorical return » in accordance with a singular catoptric where combined coincidence and time would be the project managers.
If the Sambre is the river that draws together Raymond Douillet and Jean de Mabuse beyond time, it is also the link with René Magritte when flowing through nearby Charleroi. It was in 1912 in the Sambre in Charleroi that Magritte’s mother’s body was recovered, and in this town, his first impressionistic-painted works came into being.
Working at his studio in an old coaching inn among the fields of a French farm community, the artist creates works unparalleled in quality and attention to detail. Viewers are often surprised to learn that the models who people the artist’s canvases are not highly-paid models, but rather, common townsfolk, close friends, and most often family. Their poses are incorporated into the overall architectural framework of the pieces, or, as in the case of smaller works, their movements and expressions can become this framework. And while the true meaning of the finished work is left to the viewer to determine, Douillet frequently paints to show us parallels between verbal and physical expression, as well as commonalities between the English and French languages: a game we refer to as double entendre.
Douillet has been a member of the Salon des Artistes Francais since 1975 and the Salon d’Automne since 1978. His paintings grace a number of important corporate and private collections worldwide.
What is Gen Society?
Gen Society is an art space blog for visual art and creative writing collaborations, and other randomizations. Hosted by writer and musician Lorin Drexler, this online venue is an expressive experience for those interested in the world of the arts. It is a poetic journey through the hearts and minds of contemporary artists in practice and a reflection of those that have long passed.
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