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Two months ago, I accepted Roland Buraud's invitation to visit his studio near the Bastille.

Having met him during the Jean Rustin exhibition I organized at the Caves de Babylone, he struck me as relatively reserved and not particularly inclined to discuss his work. One of his friends, who accompanied him, had taken it upon herself to act as his ambassador.

After climbing three flights of stairs, I discovered a large room bathed in the beautiful light of a sunny early spring morning. The studio was long and narrow, with relatively low ceilings. On the right side of the space stood four massive canvases, approximately 5 meters by 2 meters each, pushing the spatial limits of the room—an important detail, given that an artist’s work often reflects the topography of their studio.

Opposite these large compositions lay a still life of Chinese brushes, souvenirs from his recent trips to China. Roland has exhibited in China and regularly travels there to conduct workshops with fine arts students.

Roland Buraud must have spent long hours mastering Photoshop, using it as a tool to sketch and shape the seeds of his latest works. What initially seemed like a learning process has become a genuine painter’s approach, with the computer evolving into a natural extension of his hand and brush, firmly anchoring his practice in modernity.

As André Rouillé aptly put it:
"Painting is no longer limited to the age-old alloy of pigments and canvas affixed to the wall. Instead, it is seen as a mode of making and perceiving art. It’s about the body, gesture, and material. To see in painting is to be attuned to making, to objects, to qualities of light, material, and form, to temporalities and opacities, to resonances stemming from the entire history of art, and to the whispers of the world tucked into the folds of works."

This open, contemporary conception of painting is precisely what Roland Buraud is exploring. Through the deconstruction of his past works, he creates the raw material for his new pictorial compositions. Juxtaposing image fragments, incorporating pieces as counterpoints in chiaroscuro, adding or blending flat areas of color, he builds entirely new works where the body becomes a medium of catharsis.

The entirety of these digital works forms the substance of a book the artist has recently completed, now available for purchase.

Pushing his investigations even further, Buraud extends his pictorial process into video art. His digital works have been assembled into a single long tracking shot, creating a singular video piece. This project carries the weight of a masterwork, with both its visual and auditory elements taking on unprecedented dimensions, exuding a jubilant energy that is palpable in the final product.

As R. Arnold B. writes in the preface to the book:
"It was after his first trip to China, in August 2004, that he embarked on this long series of 'virtual' paintings and digital prints—a provisional synthesis of his previous years’ work and the spatial philosophy of Chinese ink painters. One must understand this series in relation to the traditional Chinese scroll, infinite in duration, marking space with signs... 'The One gives birth to the Two, the Two to the Three, and the Three to the Ten Thousand Beings'—the founding principle of Taoist creation."

This “digital series” has also resulted in limited-edition inkjet prints on high-quality paper, with an impressive fidelity to the authenticity of the pictorial material and the intensity of the artist’s palette. An excellent way for art enthusiasts to acquire a piece of Buraud’s work without jeopardizing their upcoming vacation plans.

Litanie à desseins ou "The computer painting": Texte

Litany of designs or "The computer painting"

by Olivier Castaing

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Olivier Castaing and founder and artistic director of School Galery Paris.

©2025 by Etienne Buraud

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