Artists

After my artistic studies, I dedicated my career to image : illustrator, art director and finally history of Arts teacher, and applied arts. Since 1995, I paint, sculpt and exhibit. Nourished by the works of painters such as Caillebotte, Hopper, Vélikovic, Freud, Bacon, as well as those of Narrative Figuration such as Monory, I followed this advice: "don’t learn to paint, paint!" My double American and French origins are definetly influencing the choice of some of my subjects. My inspiration is fuelled by our technical civilization and its relationship to the natural world. The figurative paintings combine natural motifs in dialogue with my own inventions. The images are imaginary representations, metaphors that express truths beyond their visible form. I like to confront fiction and reality, nature and artifice. I consider my images to have achieved their purpose when they blur interpretations and cause confusion in the viewer. I feel close to the approach of the Narrative Figuration’s artists. I don’t seek to make "beautiful" paintings but meaningful images. I paint to tell sensations, moods, stories that are beyond me. I let myself be guided by my brushes, they teach me something about me, about the world too. It is a demanding work, parallel, pervasive, transcendent universe." But as had said Francis Bacon: "If you can say that, why bother painting it?"

A self-taught multidisciplinary artist, known for his surrealist paintings and sculptures, Hisham Echafaki has been exhibiting internationally since 2012. Between realism and surrealism, his artworks transport us into a universe where the beauty and diversity of fauna and flora are celebrated in all their patterns and colours, blurring the boundaries between the real and the imaginary. Without being moralising, they become the medium for a potential narrative from which a fiction or an analysis of the animal's status in a declining nature, threatened by human activity, can be constructed. While paying tribute to ecological diversity, his art sensitively and poetically, sometimes with dark humour, tackles themes of habitat destruction and artificialisation, pollution, and the overexploitation of natural resources. In 2015, Hisham presented his solo exhibition 'Lusus Naturae' in London with Butterfly Art News. In 2016, he created works for the prestigious Donmar Warehouse theatre company in London, which were exhibited in several programs. In parallel, he has participated in numerous exhibitions with Opera Gallery in Paris, London, Dubai, and also regularly exhibits at contemporary art fairs with Saatchi Art in Los Angeles, Bristol, and London. In 2019, Hisham Echafaki created a monumental 13-meter work on the façade of the Musée de la Poste in Paris to celebrate its reopening after six years of renovations. In 2022, the Museum Jean Larcena in Val d’Ocre held a monographic exhibition dedicated to him titled Mirabilia Naturae. In December 2023, Hisham signed an artistic collaboration with the international jewellery brand Pandora for their Christmas collection 'Love Unboxed,' designing a pendant as well as creating a temporary immersive art installation in London. In May 2024, he presents a retrospective of his art at the Cultural Centre of Joigny with over 50 paintings and sculptures and creates a mural for the Music Conserva of the town. His works are present in several private and public collections in the United Kingdom and internationally.