236 - ◊ Richard TEXIER (1955)

◊ Richard TEXIER (1955) Ré Mixed media on a fragment of sailcloth, signed and dated 2001. Dimensions: 104 x 82 cm Framed with a Plexiglas mat. (Height: 134 cm) Note: Richard Texier (born in 1955 in Niort) is one of the most influential French contemporary artists of his generation. Trained as an architect, he turned to painting and sculpture at a very early age, guided by a fascination with the mystery of the world and the magical dimension of existence. His childhood, spent between the Atlantic coast and the Poitevin Marshes, left a lasting imprint on his imagination, where the ocean, astronomy, and symbols of navigation (sextants, compasses, spinning tops) became recurring motifs, serving as tools for an inner and creative journey. Appointed Official Painter to the Navy in 2003, Richard Texier embodies the nomadic artist, setting up his studios in the four corners of the world (New York, Moscow, Shanghai, La Rochelle, Hyères…). His work, both monumental and poetic, explores the hybridization of cultures, knowledge, and myths, drawing inspiration from pre-Columbian, Egyptian, Chinese, and Indian civilizations, as well as their mythical animals—symbols of protection and life. His work, often described as “personal cosmography,” seeks to capture the elasticity of the imagination and the void at the origins of consciousness and the cosmos, where everything is real at the very moment the world is being invented. The “Elastogenesis” series, for example, reflects this dreamlike and conceptual quest, while his paintings and sculptures—such as “Les Outils navigateurs” or “Théoria Sacra”—reveal an obsession with space, time, and metamorphosis. These fragments of sails—the mediums for his creations, carried by the wind and journeys—perfectly embody the spirit of Richard Texier: a body of work in motion, at the crossroads of human adventure and artistic quest, where each piece becomes a fragment of a dream and a horizon.