Colour, sound and movement are at the heart of Sandrine Astier's painting. Her pictorial process is informed by music and dance. She sharpens her brush to the vibration of music, composes her palette and attunes the movement of her body to the precision of her brushstrokes on canvas.
For the past twenty years, this multifaceted painter has been creating portraits of musicians, mainly large-format oil paintings on canvas, with striking figures, enhanced by great precision of gesture and marked chromatic power. Set in dreamlike landscapes, fictional urban settings or fantastical scenes, the characters take on iconic status, at the crossroads between Frida Kahlo and the masters of the Renaissance. Her technique is based on the repetition of layers and a mastery of repentance, giving the works an esoteric dimension.
Through this committed pictorial gesture, Sandrine Astier pays tribute to music as a form of contemporary “religion”.
Over the years, she has alternated between creating portraits and landscapes, whether preliminary studies for portrait settings or landscapes inspired by a particular piece of music, often drawing on the imagination or memories.
Her landscapes are also imbued with musical vibration: Sandrine Astier says she paints them while dancing, the movement of her body driving the gesture on the canvas. Filled with sound and carried by an explosion of colour, they act like fantastical visions, capable of opening up another world.
Driven by a desire for transcendence, Sandrine Astier relentlessly pursues harmony, joy and beauty.