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Alban de Chateauvieux + follow
Born in 1979 and trained in applied arts, Alban de Chateauvieux first worked as an illustrator before fully dedicating himself to a more personal artistic approach. Through his works, particularly the Saut/Chute/Envol series (Leap/Fall/Flight), he explores the tension between ascent and fall, balance and vertigo, where instinct interacts with precision. His suspended figures and vibrant materials capture the vital impulse and the yearning for elsewhere while revealing the fragility of movement. Between rootedness and uprooting, his painting expresses a quest for freedom constantly challenged by gravity.
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About Alban de Chateauvieux
Born in 1979 and trained in applied arts, Alban de Chateauvieux worked for nearly twenty years as an illustrator. As a watercolorist, he applies his travel sketchbook practice to high-end enterprises.
In 2018, when he established Atelier 360 within the Marseille-based creative space CocoVelten, he was preparing Milagros, his first solo exhibition in a contemporary art center. There, he developed a parallel between his collection of nearly a thousand lost animal posters and the religious practice of ex-voto. It is a reflection on intimacy and hope.
With the series Saut/Chute/Envol (Leap/Fall/Flight), he reconnects with his artistic sensibility, delivering a dynamic collection where figures and materials interact and complement each other. Vigorous brushstrokes and splashes of color on the canvas embody the artist’s generous presence in the background. On the “surface,” painting or drawing becomes more precise, almost academic. This contrast between two pictorial approaches, often opposed in the field of painting, creates a kind of sensitive vibration.
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As children, learning to walk, we discover how perilous it is to break free from the ground, how this newfound independence comes at an emotional cost. Growing up means taking risks. Tasting the unknown, expanding our reach, conquering our freedom—so many reasons to endlessly challenge the fall.
Later, in love, in our careers, and in society, our paths will always oscillate between aspirations and vertigo. Until we can no longer truly distinguish our ascents from our crashes. If I leave my job, is it flight or fall? And aging, dying… flight or fall?
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Bodies imprint themselves on the canvas, and in passing through, they tell our story. They speak of our vitality, our attempts to defy our condition, our improbable escapes... They bear witness to our vertigo and vulnerabilities. They lose their bearings in air that has turned to sea. They speak of enthusiasm but also of anxiety and raw fear. If our bodies are made of water, our souls are made of flight and falls."
Alban de Chateauvieux
The drawings, reminiscent of botanical engravings, that make up the Zoréol and Boi Sakré series evoke the artist’s cultural anchoring between Marseille and the island of Réunion, where Zoréol refers to a child born of a Zoreï (a mainland French parent) and a Kréol parent. Here, exotic vegetation acts as a bridge between two worlds. The meticulous and intricate drawings attempt to tame a free and vigorous material. These series, with their more aesthetic appearance, explore themes of rootedness and uprooting.