12 Questions with Charlie Wayne - Magazine Issue02
Charlie Wayne is a french artist featured in Al-Tiba9 magazine ISSUE02, interviewed by Mohamed Benhadj about his project The Junk food last Supper.
Charlie’s work questions the identity and the place of reality in a world where fame, image, and marketing are kings. The accumulation and proliferation of photographs in his artworks question the power of images in our society and echo the mass consumption mechanisms of our world. Each work can thus be seen as a lighting of the duality of the human, between image and identity, between passive consumption and a quest for truth.
Photo courtesy Charlie Wayne©
Please describe the intention behind your art. How do you successfully express this intention?
In everything I do, I'm obsessed with the reality of things. Fortunately, that does not prevent me from dreaming, but more than I can remember, I always try to find the true meaning of words and things! Because of my life experiences, I quickly learned that what is said, or what is shown, is often only a tiny part of the truth. This is reflected in my work. I question the identity and the place of reality in our world where fame, image, and media are kings.
Can you talk a little about your formative years as an artist?
I was immersed in the world of art from childhood. Having spent long isolated months at home for health reasons, I spent the time mentally exploring the world. I started drawing, painting, playing music, and very quickly, doing photography with my first camera that was offered to me by my parents when I was 11. I was very young faced with death, absence, loneliness, and rejection. It certainly built me as I am today. I developed a particular attraction for psychology, philosophy, and the visual arts while conducting biologist training. Having completed my Ph.D., I started a scientific career while continuing to create and train myself. I kept my creations for myself, as a loophole, and I took courses in art history offered by the MoMA of New York and the Pompidou Center of Paris. I also had the chance to learn about screen printing with a recognized artist, Janusz Stega. I think I trained as an artist more through life experiences, my curiosity about the world and the hours to work in my studio. It's only been 4 years that I dared for the first time to show my work. But this became for me a necessity that put in perspective all my life!
Photo courtesy Charlie Wayne©
Your work is highlighting the duality of the human, between image and identity, between passive consumption and a quest for truth represented in a very graphic and commercial environment. How do you turn this into an artistic expression?
I used to work in health marketing. I draw my material in fragments of real life, Internet imagery, newspapers, movies…, I plan on my studio wall, and I photograph from various angles in order to symbolically capture their energy in the manner of souls’ thieves. Imperfects like humans, deformed by the camera angle, more or less intense according to the exposure, I use these hundreds of pictures as many pixels I assemble in mosaic to recreate the final image. By this means imposing a double reading, I invite the viewer to both movement and introspection: if the overall superficial picture is made to be quickly seen at distance (as we sometimes fly over our own life), the deeper meaning is perceptible as we approach it until we touch the real. Each work can thus be seen as a lighting of the duality of the human, between image and identity, between passive consumption and a quest for truth.”
Where did you get your imagery from (What, if any, sources did you use)?
I find my imagery in the representation that we have done for centuries, in art, politics, propaganda, advertising, newspapers ... I also happen to photograph the man on the street and my everyday life. When I started presenting my work, it was often noticed that it was tinged with a dark new aesthetic. It is true that I work contrasts, noise, and that black and white remains my primary expression, as for freezing history. Color, when present, intervenes only later, to accentuate certain features, or to add symbolism to the whole.
Your work is very visual, plays with the composition of the images, interaction between history and the actual present. You create intellectual layers for your work, where the branding and advertising part of your work is what can be perceived as a first layer but then a call to spirituality and humanity as a second – thus having double questioning for the viewer, each one in a different dimension but pointing to the same artistic research. Can you talk about that?
The human is full of perplexity. When I was doing photography, I refused to make portraits because I always considered that the human is a complex whole in perpetual internal movement: so how to fix the entropy? This is probably why I only realized portraits of artists in their performance. There was a particular angle there. It was not a question of depicting human nature, but an intention at a given moment. Today, as a visual artist, I am lucky to be able to represent this complexity. Maybe my approach was also influenced by my past as a scientist: when you study an organism, you sometimes need to approach the cellular scale that composes it to truly understand this entity.
Photo courtesy Charlie Wayne©
Your production includes a specific portrait selection in a “repeat” process. In other words, you experiment with a mix of logos, commercial products, and other signs to give another representation in this case of big-scale portraits and reproductions of historical paintings. How can you describe that for our readers?
The accumulation and proliferation of photographs in my artworks question the power of images in our society and echo the mass consumption mechanisms of our world. We are overwhelmed with images in our daily lives. Often, they influence us more than they inform us. I think repetitive composition also expresses an obsession. My work can be seen as a book: we are attracted by the cover, and if it challenges us, we begin to explore the different chapters.
Your questioning about the sociological sense of freedom, politics, and religion has a direct impact on the way you construct your graphic combinations. Could you tell us about the actual present then? Can your art go through even more political and religious paths to reach the truth? How far can you go with your art?
I think that paradoxically, although the Western world has never been more secure (in the sense that it is less subject to wars than in previous centuries), we are swamped with violent images used for all purposes: information, political campaigns, religious struggles, advertising campaigns ... We live in an environment that may seem hostile and in which we must fight to win or preserve our individual freedoms. Humans sometimes tend to come close to extreme positions to feel reassured. To feel like part of a clan. By showing the dark side, I want my art to reflect this paradox. May it be a testimony of our present. A manifesto in honor of the human in his best. A celebration of life. And in any case a source of debate.
What was the influence on your work or the way in which it was made?
I think that beyond all that we were able to discuss during this interview about my approach, my work is influenced by advertising, popular imagery, and cinema. The frame of my works could be likened to a film. Even if I use the opposite process: the part of a projected image to decline to infinity on a physical medium. As to give him life.
Photo courtesy Charlie Wayne©
They say if you could be anything but an artist, don’t be an artist. What career are you neglecting right now by being an artist?
I have a Ph.D. in neuroscience and I worked for 15 years doing research and supporting health facilities and pharmaceutical companies. It's been 4 years since I devote myself exclusively to art and I must say that if I can live my art, I do not feel like giving up anything! A moment ago you have to accept that need. That of creating. I do not think I could go back now!
What current series are you working on?
I'm working on a series that explores the true hidden meaning of tales. I am convinced that in popular culture, news items, serial killers, and human monsters have replaced the fables of our childhoods and the imaginary fireside monsters. They allow us to tame our archaic fears. Moreover, by taking the place of the evil creatures of legends in our minds, "the" serial killer, image of the danger towards the community, strengthens the community itself: it is by opposing the evil it represents, that individuals recognize themselves as belonging to the same group, that of good. And we gather in crowds during white marches and demonstrations of support for the victims and their families
What is your favorite genre of music to listen to while working?
It's funny that you ask me this question. It's the music that got me interested in doing photography. The first time I was captivated by a photographic work was during a concert whose visuals had been created by the Dutch photographer Anton Corbijn. Music plays an important part in my life. It has always been a bulwark, a costume that envelops me in dark moments and accompanies me in happy moments. Beyond that, I am convinced that no energy is created, and no energy is lost. This also applies to creative energy. So thank you to the artists who accompany me on my creative nights. I listen to a lot of cold waves, pop, electro, and atmospheric music. I also listen to a lot of French post-punk bands from the late '70s and' 80s. Right now I am discovering a passion for several Icelandic bands.
Do you have any upcoming shows or collaborations?
I am in the middle of a creative tunnel, and my last exhibition this year took place in Venice where I presented my memorial to the victims of Charles Manson. And without revealing too much, I should be on show this autumn at the International Price of Contemporary Art of Monaco, under the honorary presidency of SAR Princess Caroline of Hanover. This is an important event and I am very proud to be here!
