Psychopower
Painting allows attention to be reclaimed. I am influenced by the idea that contemporary power no longer operates only through the control of bodies (as described by Michel Foucault through the concept of biopower), but also through the capture and manipulation of the mind (in reference to Bernard Stiegler’s concept of psychopower). Images, screens, and technologies constantly direct desire, shape behavior, and condition perception.
This form of psychopower works by smoothing experience, accelerating consumption, and reducing attention to short cycles. Painting is a slow and resistant medium and in this series, I deliberately refuse precision, efficiency, and technical perfection. Lines are unstable, perspectives remain unresolved, and colour fields are interrupted by irregular brushwork and thick layers of paint. These imperfections are not expressive gestures in the traditional sense, but a conscious act against the demand for control, clarity, and optimization that dominate contemporary visual culture. Where digital and industrial images aim for frictionless surfaces and total legibility, I introduce here opacity, material excess, and hesitation. The paint resists full mastery. Surfaces remain uneven, layered, and sometimes awkward. This refusal of perfection interrupts the expectation that images should function smoothly and immediately.
Evaluation logic and consolation of Nature. Oil paint on canvas. 50 x 50 cm. 2023
The best room of the house. Oil paint on canvas. 95 x 95 cm. 2023
This approach is also informed by Enlightenment values, particularly the importance of thinking for oneself. If psychopower works by directing attention and desire from the outside, then resisting it begins with restoring autonomy to perception. Painting becomes a space where reason, doubt, and self reflection can unfold autonomously. The organic and spontaneous aspects of the work are essential to this position. Thick paint, visible brushstrokes, and structural instability reintroduce the body and time into the image. They counter the abstraction of experience produced by technological systems that favor speed, repetition, and predictability. In this sense, imperfection becomes a way of protecting attention from being captured and instrumentalized. Rather than presenting idealized or optimized spaces, the paintings remain open, vulnerable, and unresolved.
The work also resonates with Plato’s allegory of the cave, in which perception is shaped by shadows mistaken for reality. In a contemporary context saturated with images, screens, and mediated experiences, these shadows take the form of endless visual representations that stand in for direct experience. Psychopower operates by organizing these shadows, directing attention toward appearances rather than understanding. My paintings do not seek to reveal a hidden truth behind the image, but to slow perception and introduce distance between what is seen and what is assumed. By suspending clarity and refusing immediate legibility, the work invites a shift from passive viewing toward an active, reflective mode of attention, where perception can move away from appearances and toward a more conscious relation to experience.
I'm outside, the sun is shining while you are there, in a cinema cavern.
Oil paint on canvas. 95 x 95 cm. 2023
Pshychopower and Innocence. Oil paint on canvas. 61 x 51 cm. 2023
La valeur de l'esprit. Oil paint on canvas. 65 x 65 cm. 2023
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