Profile: French artist Pascal Blondeau has taken an unconventional path to arrive at his goal

After being a singer, a dancer and a scenographer (performance designer) he found his true passion: photography. During his work as a scenographer at the Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris he photographed his work, a curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Skopje, Macedonia saw his photos and organized a solo exhibition of his work in 2000. Since than .His work is regularly shown in Europe, Asia and the United States

Blondeau’s work focuses on identity and the double “I” that exists in all human beings, a theme he finds especially fascinating. He is constantly seeking an aesthetic and beauty beyond perfection, a quest that often leads us to become lost in the search for a forever unobtainable Absolute.

For Blondeau, the human being is “a beautiful monster/invader/seducer, a devastating creature enfolding love and hate all at once”, He explains. “My work is inspired by these sometimes frightening and always passionate subjects.”

His new body of work “Swimming Pool, Tribute to David Hockney, 2015” was created when Blondeau was in a vacation at a friend’s house built with psychedelic colors and very original materials. “I was swimming in the middle of a painter’s palette, which reminded me of the paintings of David Hockney. I found the idea very interesting to put myself in and out of the water. Thus it became a series about narcissism, a theme I had wanted to deal with for a long time. Also I wanted my work for this series to be closer to Modern Art than Contemporary Art. Working with pools and color compositions allowed me to do this” Blondeau says.

Pascal Blondeau’s new exhibition will be presented at the Galerie Mourlot. The Gallery specializes in graphic works by modern and contemporary artists. Eric Mourlot founded the gallery in Boston in 1991 and in 2006, it relocated to New York’s Upper East Side.

Profile: Pascal Blondeau

Artist/photographer

Born, Paris – Lives and works in New York City

He was born in Paris and grew up in the neighborhood of Saint-Germain des Prés on the Left Bank.

From 1986 to 1988, he studied at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris and then went on to study photography at the Ecole Américaine, also in Paris.

In 1989, the renowned singer Alice Dona opened a music school in Paris, where he was accepted as a student after many auditions. “I’m very proud of this,” he says.

He stayed there for six years to sing, dance, do comedy and study scenography (performance design). Afterward, he sang on some of France’s most popular TV shows and at theaters throughout Paris.

In 1999, Pascal Blondeau became a scenographer at the Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris. After he photographed details of his work, a curator at Museum of Contemporary Art in Skopje, Macedonia organized a solo exhibition of his work in 2000.

He moved to New York City in 2009 and met fashion designer Vera Wang and Ultra Violet, the superstar of Andy Warhol’s Factory.

In 2011, Blondeau and Ultra Violet collaborated on the exhibition “9/11 OH MY GOD” held at The Invisible Dog in Brooklyn.

In July 2009, his series “Deneuve and Lady Swing” was performed in Bangkok, where he also had a hugely successful exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art. The series was a long process of transformation of the Thai actor-artist Michael Shaowanashai.

Other exhibitions include the Museum of Contemporary Art in Skopje (Macedonia), the Museum of Modern Art Pristina (Kosovo) and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Thessaloniki (Greece).

In 2008, he was selected by the city of Lyon and the Museum of Contemporary Art for the event Lyon September of Photography at the Caroline Vachet gallery. And in 2012, his work was the subject of an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art of Copenhagen organized by the Embassy of France in Denmark.

Two years ago, Blondeau was one of the 35 internationally acclaimed photographers whose work was selected by Christine Dutreil, executive director of the Anne Fontaine Foundation, to appear in the exhibition “Trees in Focus.” After being exhibited at Sotheby’s New York and Sotheby’s Paris, all of the photographs were donated by the artists to be sold at auction, with the proceeds going to support the foundation’s reforestation work in Brazil. Blondeau’s contribution, called Forêt Interdite, was bought at Sotheby’s Paris, marking the first time his work had entered an important private collection.