François Fréchet
Born in Switzerland in 1954, François Fréchet lived in Paris and attended a Fine Art College in Aix-en-Provence. After obtaining his degree, Fréchet returned to Paris and began working with dancers and musicians in street theatre creating inflatables for scenery, costumes and, even, inside-space for plays. In 1993, he left Paris for the countryside in the South West of France where he began studying wildflowers. Increasingly, his work evolved into using natural materials and live plants with the goal of creating a dialogue centered around the environment, biodiversity, agriculture, and the relationship between human beings and their landscape. Since 1995, he has been concentrating on creating site specific projects and has taken part in several international events, including in Chile, Belgium, France, Germany, South Korea, Australia, Taiwan, and the United States.Lautus naturalis, 2015
Working professionally since 1980, I have been creating transitory “living” interventions or installations. My final works are alive in that it carries out a cycle: birth, life and death.
Birth: is the design of the project and the setting of the work
Life: is the evolution of the work through live plants, and its meeting with the population
Death: is the end of the work, the rotting of the natural materials used, which turn over to nature, from where they derived
Today, my projects, in addition to the aesthetic dimensions of the artist, aim to inform the public (like an alarm bell, and not like giving lessons) of the urgency to preserve and safeguard this priceless inheritance of biodiversity.
My work is always thought in relation with a specific environment where geographical, social and cultural history take place to inspire the work.
It is obvious that one’s psychological and political impact (to the full sense of the term), the environment and his/her frame of mind as they approach my installation — whether it is in a street, on a place, in the woods, or in the countryside — inevitably influences his/her reaction(s), be it received or rejected, accepted or ignored.
For more information about François and his works, please visit his website at francois.frechet.pagesperso-orange.fr.
