Emilie Henry 1977-2012

Henry studied literature and art before trying for a career in dental prosthetics, which she then gave up to study psychology, before turning to art, finding inspiration with L'Art Brut and Du Buffet. She preferred to work in small format.

Émilie Henry was born on August 13, 1977 in Nancy. She spent her childhood in the Vosges. After a literary baccalaureate, she undertook studies in Plastic Art in Strasbourg, at the end of which she obtained a license. She discovered Art Brut and the collection of Jean Dubuffet in an art history course and this spontaneous expression will both fascinate her and encourage more instinctive and personal research. She leaves Strasbourg for Bordeaux where she prepares a CAP as a dental prosthetist. Once she obtained her diploma, she left for Haute Savoie where she worked for five years. Then she left for Bordeaux and undertook university studies in psychology up to her degree. After a three-year hiatus, she joined a Bordeaux laboratory where she once again worked as a dental prosthetist.

To create, she uses various materials with which she covers the sheet entirely, until outlines of fantastical creatures emerge that she reveals with a fine and precise line. She favors small formats, works with inks on old paper or the pages of her Moleskine notebook, also uses the collage of elements gleaned from old books: submarines, organs of the human anatomy, architectural elements, structures old machinery, etc., which she keeps in a file and chooses according to needs. In his drawings, tones of brown, yellow, sepia and black predominate. The landscapes are bathed in lunar light where the liquid element, the mineral and the vegetation occupy a preponderant place. The peaceful waters where boats glide are surrounded by rock walls on which Gothic castles sometimes stand perched on dizzying slopes. As for human beings, they seem statuary and as if pushed from the earth or anchored in it. They emerge, solitary and similar to the eroded mineral forms of the landscape. Other designs are made from a background composed of small characters and faces intertwined with each other and which form lace pancakes; in juxtaposition, imposing beings appear executed in ink, in a more spontaneous manner.

Émilie Henry lived in Bordeaux where she died in 2012.