Softtwix
THE FACE BEHIND THE MASK
PLURAL IDENTITIES
How did you become an artist? When did you start out busking?
I already had a photographic practice, but going out into the street allowed me to surprise the public and reach all ages and all social categories, from the kid who shows it to his parents to the elderly person, without the need to go see an exhibition.
Is it important for you to have a character in the street?
I like the fact that it's not Me. This isn't about protection, but rather about allowing Softtwix to have its own identity. It's an entity not directly linked to me personally: it's fundamentally me, yet it's impossible to know whether it's a man or a woman. I didn't like the idea of selling my work as a woman, because I wanted it to exist on its own. Indeed, linking the work to the person creates a kind of seduction tied to the individual. My work must resonate with people in and of itself.
Was Softtwix created to tackle the E.Doll project?
Softtwix is a nickname I had in high school. I adopted it as my pseudonym after starting this graphic work. I consider time a friend to my projects and don't rush things. I worked for two years to bring the E.Doll project to life. I built up an image bank with all my portraits and all my wounds. The research that makes up these characters forms a whole, and that's why I don't plan to stop. Some people work in phases, but for me, research spans a lifetime, although it may evolve.
(UN)MASKED PORTRAITS
Do you consider these composite portraits to be masks? Through these gazes without apparent expression, a composition between presence and absence is played out.
It is indeed a story of masks, in the sense that these characters fall The mask. Society expects women, regardless of age, to remain feminine, made up, and elegant. Here, they are, but they also reveal another facet, bearing the scars of their history and experiences. Peaceful, they are all different, yet share the same gaze. It is this gaze that testifies to the connection we have with one another: we are all in this life and we all face the same constraints (although we are not all affected by them in the same way), whether it be the passing of time and old age, life experiences such as marriage or children, illness, and death.
Could you elaborate on the importance of the gaze in your portraits?
I think that the gaze has been important to me since my early days in photography. At one point, it was even impossible for me to work with anything other than a direct gaze, and I've never liked taking profile portraits. Looking into someone's eyes means being present as an individual and embracing that presence.
These independent female figures call out to passersby. Through their gaze, the question of looking itself also arises. to be looked at. This raises questions about how they are perceived or about a possible male gaze.
They're not there to challenge us: if they look us in the eye, it's because they embrace the women they are. They are strong, but they don't question the viewer. I wouldn't want them to question us. Besides, it's not us who are looking at them, but rather they who have come to look at us. I like this situation: at first, we think we see them, but very quickly we realize that it's us who are being looked at. This exchange of positions is at the heart of my work.
These composite portraits are aesthetically reminiscent of the appearance of the ghosts in the No. 1 theatre.
There's something very delicate, refined, and pure about this Japanese aesthetic that resonates with me. I'm often asked about my tendency to avoid public performances. But I like the idea that people discover the collage when they wake up in the morning. Watching me paste up pieces of paper would be less interesting than watching a painter at work. Through this nocturnal collage, the artwork appears almost like a ghost, as if no one has put it up. Paradoxically, I disappear through the act itself. I find this process of emergence very appealing. There are things we do instinctively, absorbing what surrounds us. I lived in Japan for four years, and my work bears the marks of that time.
STREET PHOTOGRAPHY
How do you perceive the use of photography in urban spaces, particularly regarding the extension from small to very large formats that this implies?
The issue of the support has always been a concern for me. Paradoxically, I've always refused to work with paper. I've been a photographer for twenty years, and yet I've rarely agreed to offer my photos on this medium, which hasn't been without its challenges. For my first exhibition, I hollowed out plywood panels to remove one of the wood veneers. I then prepared the surrounding wood by staining and varnishing it, adding gold leaf inserts or pyrography details. I glued my image into the resulting cavity before covering it with hundreds of layers of varnish, sanding between each coat, so as to embed the image into the panel like Chinese lacquer. I had to stop this highly toxic technique because I wanted to have a child.
So, I developed a technique for transferring my photos onto wood. I used an 8x10 camera with Polaroid 809 film, which allowed me to transfer the emulsion onto another surface. I had to put it in a bath at 73 degrees Celsius to melt the gelatin and release the emulsion, then take it out and put it in another bath at 55 degrees Celsius. Then I applied the resulting emulsion to the wood. I worked this way until Polaroid closed its doors in 2006. Stopping this technique was torture. The move to the wall came from this realization: I had lost my transfer technique, I had lost film photography, but the wall thus became something other than just paper, a material that, by emerging from the paper's texture, evoked the wood that appeared through the emulsion—a very logical continuation of my work.
Why such a dislike for paper?
I don't know myself, even though at one time I printed all my photos, going through the entire process. This question arises again when it comes to moving from the street to the gallery: I did a multitude of tests on metal and fabric, like old cotton sheets I found at flea markets. Through trial and error, I discovered methods for making my ink transfers. But with this technique, I only succeeded with one image for every six or seven failures. I ended up using watercolor paper with anti-reflective coatings because it offered the contrast I was looking for, with very deep blacks. I was very surprised to end up using this technique when for twenty years I had done everything I could to avoid it. I think loving and hating paper has been the struggle of my life, a passionate affair. But perhaps this journey was necessary to reach the balance I have now. For street art I work with large inkjet plotters, printing my images myself.
Photography is at the origin and end of your work; it is both the matrix and the result. What, for you, constitutes a work of art?
There aren't many of us collage artists who work with our own photographs. Personally, I see myself more as a photographer creating an installation. I don't paste things up in the street to gain visibility, but because the street is an integral part of my composition. My work is a mise en abyme that doesn't exist without the street; the final piece is actually the photograph taken at the end of the installation. Once the piece is placed in the street and offered to the public, it becomes street art. I couldn't say that this is just a stage, because it then exists as such for people. But for me, from the creation of the face to that of the architecture that frames it, everything exists as a photographic work.
Have you always worked in black and white?
I've always worked in black and white; the primary reason was that it allowed me to have a darkroom at home, which is impossible with color photography, which uses entirely different chemical processes. Only black and white could fulfill this desire to control my image from beginning to end, from capture to film development and printing. I know, however, that my working method is very different from that of younger generations who didn't experience film. I now use digital, but I process it with the same contrast and grain as I did back then. Even so, it's not the same magic, and I think that one day I'll return to a studio in Paris so I can continue to enrich my work with a large-format camera.
How do you conceive of your images in space? The architectural elements you add at festivals recreate a context that did not previously exist.
When you're a collage artist, you have to try to push your models to their limits, because the creative work takes place in the studio, and on location it's more of a technical execution. Some artists will spend a week painting something incredible, and it's unsettling to have created your work beforehand… It was these festival commissions that led me to consider the architecture framing my image, because the street is no longer there to provide a natural setting. I initially rejected these soulless walls that didn't interest me. By adding architectural elements, I create the fusion between the wall and the face myself, using a slant to make them surprising again. It goes beyond simple photography, especially when I incorporate elements from different places, whether they come from a church in Chalon-sur-Saône or a stained-glass window in Brussels. Thanks to these effects of depth, viewers have the impression of facing a three-dimensional piece. This brings my approach closer to Street art, where this 3D effect is often sought after.
ON URBAN ART
What is your relationship to the ephemeral nature of your urban artworks?
This doesn't sit well with me at all: I appreciate the ephemeral in others, but I reject it in my own work. Thus, I'm unable to sell a single piece, and I have a lot of space at home occupied by works I've chosen to keep. I try to accept it by considering it consistent with my work, which deals with life, and therefore with the ephemeral. By creating the final image of my installation, I free it from its time spent in situ…
Urban artists often seek a surface with a history to engage with. With your images, you first cover the wall, allowing it to re-emerge through the scars of faces. A certain way of covering in order to reveal.
A wall always has a story, but it isn't always visible. For the Transition event in Abbeville, I found myself in a child's bedroom in a social housing block. While this room may have a history, it's far removed from street art. Faced with these walls, you have to think about how to create immersion and surprise the viewer who will walk through the block of flats, visiting some forty rooms, each representing a different world. That's the challenge. Since I had the option of closing off the room, I recreated a kind of dungeon to try and transport the person discovering it to a completely different place. I also pasted my work onto the bay window, using the light passing through the image to create an atmosphere and transport the viewer to a parallel space.
In what way is the street a unique space for creation?
For seven years I had a workshop in a disused 19th-century printing workse The arrondissement. It was a harsh place: we only had cold water, and the indoor temperature dropped in winter to the same level as the outdoor temperature, and rose much higher in summer because of the large skylight. In that kind of place, you always work with the bare minimum, because it's risky to have too much stuff in case it's suddenly boarded up by the police. Yet, when I left Paris, when I lost it, I realized how much I missed that harshness. It's that feeling I rediscovered in the street: leaving at night with my collages, feeling cold, feeling hot, making sure no one's behind me, being ready to run if I get into trouble. Everyone has a different perspective, but for me, working in the street implies a certain hardship. I believe that this harshness leads to what's essential. More than just a medium, the street becomes a way of working. Lately I've been leaning more towards urban exploration, because it's easier to find abandoned places in the countryside. While it might be difficult to get in, once you're there you can stay for hours in the same room, which makes for a more comfortable working environment.
Do you consider Urban Art to be an artistic movement?
From the moment a work is created in the street, for me it is Urban Art. I know people have a problem with Street Art, which is why I would include street musicians, performers, and all those who seek to create an emotion and offer it freely to others, alongside graphic works. The street is an expression, a way to touch people and move them. I have, in effect, become part of it by leaving my mark.
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