CHEBISIHEM

DesI was born in Tunis on November 6, 1967. I left my country of birth at the age of 4 to return to the country of my heart, France.  For several years I have lived between Paris and Tunis. I married Sylvain Vilain and I bear his name, but my gallery is Chebisihem.

I worked for a long time in the pharmaceutical industry and converted to interior architecture, but it was design that caught my attention. Also, I spent a few years creating a line of interior white from old textiles. I like the texture of old materials, embroidery, tapestries, lace and especially those where the patina enhances the color.

I arrived at the Dauphine market after leaving Biarritz where I had escaped for a few years with my husband, Sylvain. My return to Paris was marked by a new life, artistic this time. Textiles gradually gave way to paper as I presented my textile creations at the Paris Saint Ouen flea market.
I can say that color has always guided my steps--as long as I listened to my heart. This is what I have been doing since I started painting on architectural plans.

I am very sensitive to color and always have been. Perhaps it is because at a very young age I had to leave a very bright country for a country with gray and low skies. Intuitively, color came to nourish my imagination. Poets and believers say that light is “divine”. I know that everything is light, that every being and everything is inhabited by this light. When I paint it is with the aim of capturing this luminosity. I try to do it with my inner gaze. This is why I rarely use the color black. I prefer to suggest the shadow contained in the color itself.

Alchemists say that the quest for the Grail is in fact the ultimate quest for truth, that is, light. We must understand light as “knowledge”. Alchemy consists of removing the layers of shadows that cover everything to reveal the light that composes it and therefore the knowledge it contains. We men and women are also dressed in dark veils that hide our true nature. I try to create the conditions for this state of quiet joy by playing with the wavelengths of light to bring out emotion. The moment when color allows an emotion to blossom, time disappears, and the present takes place. The connection with all living things occurs instantly.

I can only draw on fluid materials. I don't like solid supports. Maybe it's because I spent all my summers in my family's sewing workshop in Tunisia. “Crepe de chine” “viscose” “silk” “cotton” “organza”, all these materials I recognized by touch. But it was the light which passed through the fiber which indicated to me the nature of the material in the sense that it was pure or mixed with other textures. So I got into the habit of looking carefully at the effect of light on matter as a frame. The traces of light on the material become patinated like on a piece of furniture, a tapestry or an old painting. I like to draw on this patina.

Architectural plans constitute the majority of my creative supports because they are marked by this patina of time and are therefore witnesses of a bygone past. During the time of a creation, I relive childhood and the light that shines through it. I summon a present as an eternal emotion to relive. It was through my wanderings in the Parisian and Tunisian streets of my childhood that I discovered the importance of traces of our history contained in the architectural plans that we neglect. You can never open a set without feeling an emotion. The outline of a vault, the aligned numbers which provide information on the dimensions of a house, the name of the architect who created this support bear witness to the past. I like to awaken what is latent, what lies dormant in the paper. There is the support itself but there is also the scent, the shape, the size…
Discovering an ancient map is like discovering a book that contains a story. I listen and I interact.cription text goes here

My subjects include the themes of plants, water and the stars. They overlap and constitute the framework of a colorful universe, constantly renewed for the benefit of a new tale, or a legend which nourished childhood.

Life holds mysteries and I like to believe that I can discover and share them. The magic of color allows us to overturn codes and reinterpret all legends because I believe in their reality.

It’s like practicing mass hypnosis , you color one object to show another. Also, my motifs are the main characters of these tales. Chimeras, mysterious heroines the chimeras that I repeat endlessly carry within them a secret to reaching the meditative state of contemplation.
This state is the ideal time to escape from a common reality to a parallel reality. It is in this timeless space that I try to create a bond with others outside of the codes that limit our freedom to be.

My philosophy :
“Man is a spiritual being who comes to have a human experience”
I deeply respect difference. The uniqueness which contributes to the diversity of life is a profound wealth undermined by our so-called “modern” societies. My fight advocates uniqueness against the standardization that is rampant on a systemic scale.
It is our differences that make us rich…
Each painting is a testimony to this philosophy.iption text goes here