French Artist Iris Fossier Invites Ashgabat Residents to World of Papier Mache

Arranged at the French Institute, an exhibition of French artist Iris Fossier has attracted professional artists and art lovers alike. Iris Fossier, a graduate of the Higher National School of Decorative Arts and Higher National School of Fine Arts in Paris, has become an avant-garde artist with a distinctive outlook on the world – ingenuous and charged with emotions. That is why her works exude such a powerful magnetism.

Iris works in papier mache - a mixture of glue and starch - and creates decorative objects. For the most part, they are tea and coffee sets of unusual shapes, slightly elongated and flattened. One of the teacups is even contour-shaped.

Iris has exhibited her papier mache items in Paris, Brussels, Madrid, and London and received positive responses from modern art enthusiasts. The exhibits also left a lasting impression on visitors to the Ashgabat exhibition with their originality.

Paper tea sets belong to small forms of sculpture. Iris Fossier is not only a sculptor, but also an artist. She is particularly drawn to seas, small ships surrounded by endless glassy expanses of water, and animals. Predictably, she identifies herself as an avant-garde artist. The artist, who has a very peculiar individual style of painting, led a master class for students of the French Institute in Turkmenistan to share her secrets. First, she impresses a carved design onto a soft surface, and then paints the embossed image.

Iris Fossier is a highly acclaimed illustrator of children’s books. Her album entitled ‘Fanfan’ came out in 2012; ‘One+One=Three’ is now in active preparation and will appear soon. The exhibition features several illustrations from the album ‘Fanfan’: sparrows, giraffes, monkeys, an ostrich on the pedestal, American Indians, and others.

After the exhibition, it was interesting to ask Turkmen artists for their opinions. Surrealist painter Aiya Surhenova said that she finds the French artist’s graphic paintings particularly fascinating. Miniature painter Tajemal Gylychdurdyeva highlighted a distinctive minimalist character in Iris Fossier’s works that enhances the understanding of underlying meanings. Volunteer Gulya Kurbanova admired Iris’s artistic talent and noted that it makes possible to transcend the traditional perception of beauty, get a feel of the versatile nature and visual indications of objects and phenomena in the world around. Realist painter Gulnaz Rozygulova offered her warm thanks to the French guest for the chance to see the world through a prism of her creativity.