Auguste

Colourful, evocative and nostalgic, the paintings and sculptures of French artist Auguste are witty and light-hearted deconstructions of images found in the universal library of popular culture. His internationally renowned work draws together celebrity icons, comic books, movies, brand logos, and those everyday objects which have taken on a cultural significance of their own due to the trail blazed by artists such as Andy Warhol in the 1950s.

Auguste loves to play with form and shape and presents many of his works as matching pairs of images, one a piece of the other which has been cut out and displayed alongside it. These silhouettes, immediately recognisable to us all, are a mischievous sideways nod to the classic cartoon ‘hole in the wall’ when one of our favourite characters, Bugs Bunny perhaps, has crashed through it at breakneck speed. This facet of his work is one of the things which has made it so hugely successful as it draws on both our love of the familiar and our nostalgic affection for the past.

Auguste represents all the separate iconic elements of his work within an objective and exhilarating world of colour, and uses a series of playful and ironic techniques to surprise, amuse and dazzle his audience. Working with a variety of materials, he composes his distinctive paintings and sculptures from a unique blend of mixed media. Often working on aluminium with digital collage and acrylic paint, he finishes each piece with the automotive varnish used by Aston Martin which gives them a modern, glossy and glamorous sheen.

Auguste has termed his oeuvre ‘Generations’ as his works reference those pop culture tropes from his own early life which have remained timeless; by conjuring these enduringly popular memories of previous eras, he brings the generations together with his artistic invitation to an uplifting party that anyone and everyone can enjoy. Many international personalities own his creations including Leonardo DiCaprio, Kim Kardashian, Rafael Nadal, Andre Agassi, Jennifer Lawrence and Michael Jordan.

Born in 1977 in Bordeaux, Auguste now divides his time between France and the United States. His work has been greeted with acclaim across the US, Europe and Asia.

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