JEAN-MICHEL OTHONIEL

Jean-Michel Othoniel’s enchanting aesthetics revolves around the notion of emotional geometry. Using the repetition of modular elements such as bricks or his signature beads, which are his most recurring motif, he creates exquisite jewelry-like sculptures whose relationship to human scale ranges from intimacy to monumentality. His predilection for materials with reversible and often reflective properties–particularly blown glass that has been the hallmark of his practice since the early 1990s–relates to the deeply equivocal nature of his art. Monumental yet delicate, baroque yet minimal, poetic yet political, his contemplative forms, like oxymorons, have the power to reconcile opposites. While his dedication to site-specific commissions for public spaces has led some of his work to take an almost architectural turn, Jean-Michel Othoniel’s holistic sensibility further compares to feng shui or the art of harmonising people with their environment, in his case allowing viewers to inhabit his world through reflection and motion.