Pauline Bétrancourt

Pauline is a French artist who lives and works in Aix-en-Provence. She has been a practicing artist for the past 20 years, she obtained her MFA in 2009 from l’Ecole Supérieure d’Art d’Aix-en-Provence.

Her practice of painting and drawing was profoundly enriched by a group of artists from The Leo Marchutz School of Painting and Drawing in Aix-en-Provence.

She works on the motif, directly from nature with oil paints and pastels, charcoal and graphite.

In her process, she is moved by what she sees and pursues to render it with spontaneity. She chooses to render a vision in which elements create a dramatic unity, coming together as in a chorus. It all seems to hum in a poignant harmony, something uncanny, which can only be distilled over time through looking.

Under a particular light emerge tableaux: the growth of a sapling reaching toward the light, the enduringness of a mountain, or dawn chasing away the night.

Within the fusion of color, shadow and light, is created the patterns and the movement of the original view and its mystery. The rendered forces then become everlasting beings, quietly giving us hope in learning how to live.

Selected works

“I stop. A configuration becomes a motif. I am moved and urged to render it because it will never happen again. The bathing light gives the tone to a dramatic unity. Vision precedes words and as I work, drawing or painting, my attempt is to pursue with accuracy and spontaneity what I saw arising. My strokes are percussive and they create a beating world.”

All images property of the artist.

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