Christoff Debusschère, Peintre Officiel De La Marine, Le Hangar De Mondésir 1990

Christoff Debusschère
Pintre officiel de la Marine
Le hangar de Mondésir (circa 1990)
huile sur toile
81x100cm

Born in 1962 in Paris, Christoff Debusschere was introduced to painting at an early age by his mother, a painter and musician. From 1978, when he moved with his family to Etampes, he attended Philippe Lejeune's classes at the Atelier de la Vigne. Lejeune became his teacher, and Christoff Debusschere one of the most talented representatives of the Etampes School today. Respectful of the great pictorial tradition, his work is fast-paced, inventive and original. In his paintings, he favors several subjects: portraits, artists' studios, technical subjects and, in particular, those relating to the navy or aviation. He did not make any preliminary drawings. He works with a cerebral urgency, using broad bands of color. His eye translates what he perceives into ample forms. The result is a beautiful, silent work, as if time were suspended. A product of the Etampes School, characterized by a deliberate touch, an acute analysis of light and a thorough knowledge of classical craftsmanship, his painting explores subjects that have nothing in common with the legacy of tradition: abandoned sheds, oily garages, machines out of use and therefore out of time. He makes no secret of his fascination with the detritus of the modern world, a fascination shared by certain avant-garde movements. He senses their suggestive power, and reveals the role they play as intercessors in our imagination. The human figure remains absent from his landscapes, which take on a slightly nostalgic silence. Sober, rapid, refusing detail, his works go to the essential, obeying the sole objective of immediate, hushed emotion. In his interiors, the painter marvelously captures a presence, suspending the time of absence. A rickety chair being restored takes on a meaning that goes beyond its status as a seat when it takes pride of place on the cabinetmaker's workbench. When portrayed by an artist, it is stripped of its banality and transformed from an object into the mirror of a fatal destiny. It illustrates vanities and illusions. Christoff Debusschere's world is frozen in silence. Haunted by ghosts, it draws its suggestiveness from the irreconcilable meeting of everyday life and tragedy. Christoff Debusschere has won numerous awards, including the silver and gold medals at the Salon des Artistes Français, the Taylor Prize awarded by the Salon d'Automne, the Salon des Invalides Prize, the Grand Prix du Salon du Bourget, the Minister of Defense Prize and the Princess Grace of Monaco Foundation Prize. He was appointed Peintre officiel de l'Air in 1992, Peintre officiel de la Marine and Peintre officiel de l'Armée de terre in 1997. He became a member of the official Navy painters' corps in 2008.