Recent paintings by Mickaël Doucet can currently be experienced via an online 3D exhibition, presented by Marion Guggenheim. The French artist’s work depicts architectural living spaces in conversations with nature—devoid of any figures. While no people are represented, they do leave a trace of their existence. These places have a certain feeling of having been lived in—giving viewers a feeling of transgressing on someone’s privacy.
On view are 21 paintings that allow us to peer through a window into the mystery, intimacy, and serenity of one’s home where order, beauty, peace, and pleasure reign. Doucet’s approach offers a contemporary version of Charles Baudelaire‘s Invitation to the Voyage. The 3D experience allows users to navigate a gallery installation of this new work—an isolated journey eerily reminiscent of Doucet’s interior scenes.
Curator Marion Guggenheim describes Doucet’s work as, “A feeling of luxury: especially the luxury of being alone in calm and empty spaces, something really rare in our urban life. But in the same time, there is always a slight feeling of anxiety that reminds us of the fear of loneliness in an over-connected age. This ambiguity between serenity and melancholia can be found both in Doucet’s aesthetics and subjects. The empty spaces he paints can be viewed as mental areas, made of memories or indistinct feelings.”
