How French visual artist L’Atlas is changing the geometric art movement with calligraphy

L’Atlas, Shapes #2, 2013, spray paint on wood, 280 x 160 cm, unique piece in the Agnès b. art collection. Courtesy of the Collection Agnès b.

L’Atlas, aka Jules Dedet Granel, is going through a period of personal introspection. He released a monograph published by Skira last year — the most comprehensive book on his work to date. In it, he highlights his subjects of predilection: abstraction, gesture, and geometry.

Now, he’s taking stock of his artistic career over the past 25 years and contemplating his next steps.

The mid-career artist no longer asks himself what he hopes the viewer will take away from his work. “It’s not that I don’t care what people think or feel, but I’m more focused on my own feelings — what my art will bring me,” he divulges.

“It’s me whom I want to seduce, and the challenge is to continue enjoying creating,” L’Atlas adds. “There will always be people who like it and others who don’t. Today, I’m more interested in having practical or technical discussions with other painters, seeing how they work, and understanding their process. It’s more the intrinsic question of painting itself — how and why you do things. I’m in a period where I need to renourish myself by going to museums, artist studios, and travelling again.”

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