Cyprien Gaillard is one of the most impressive and enigmatic artists working today. He makes work that not only deals with documenting ruins but also turning them into artworks. His works are infused with an existential melancholy and it’s no wonder he won the Marcel Duchamp Prize in 2010.
The work of Cyprien Gaillard draws on the beauty of human failure. He uses dereliction as a starting point for his work and has created a series based on his findings.
Cyprien Gaillard grew up in Belgium and studied art history at the University of Ghent. He later pursued filmmaking and photography, perhaps because they use a different set of methods for working with time. His first film is entitled “Virtual Reality” and documents the making of his work (which he refers to as “virtual”) from 2003 to 2008. He has also produced short films on sculpture, performance, and fire extinguishers, which demonstrate how objects can be used in unconventional ways.
Cyprien Gaillard is a French artist who creates his art outside the boundaries of the studio.
In a career spanning more than 30 years and more than 100 projects, Cyprien Gaillard has been one of the most prolific—and iconic—artists of his generation. Born in France in 1980, Gaillard’s highly stylistic approach to video and photography has garnered him international acclaim. His prolificacy demonstrates how the artist is never content simply making work, but continually re-imagining his practice and responding to new stimuli.
From this profile, it becomes clear that Gaillard is an artist who focuses on the natural and the human-made world, often incorporating his own artwork into settings that occur naturally. He gains inspiration from a variety of places, such as other artists with whom he speaks or works.
It’s evident that the settings in which he creates are important to him and integral to the creative process. And so we can conclude that Gaillard is an artist whose work is most influenced by his surroundings and the context in which he is creating.
It’s Gaillard’s approach to art history that is likely the most appealing. He borrows from many different movements, from Classicists to Futurists, and reshapes them in his own image. The beauty of this is that he does so without sacrificing any integrity to the history involved. In short, he is not trying to be some movement; he is just himself, and he uses everything around him to make his art as great as it can be.
He loves to travel and loves to explore. He loves photography. His favorite medium is etching.
he has received many awards and honors, including The Marcel Duchamp Prize in 2010.