Inlé Lake is a solo exhibition by Chashama’s Fellow Artist Sarah Philouze.
In 2019, Sarah Philouze had the chance to travel across Myanmar and she fell in love with a place called Inlé Lake. The lake is a giant floating garden where artisans cultivate lotus flowers for weaving, surrounded by houses on stilt. Philouze remarked that it is the most beautiful and peaceful place she has ever visited. She spent hours observing and drawing the lotus flowers and visiting the weaving workshops. Back at work in her studio in New York, Sarah explored the lotus shapes with different materials. She created a floating installation of 100 lotus flowers woven on wood. From below, the overlap of the flowers creates areas with varying densities, playing with transparency. Exploring nature around the world is her main source of inspiration. By creating this installation, Sarah hopes to bring out a bit of poetry she found in this magical place.
About the Artist:
Sarah Philouze is a French large-scale installation artist based in New York City. Her practice is inspired by all kinds of fractals and repeating patterns found in nature. At the age of 18, she was admitted to the renowned art school of Duperee and moved to Paris to pursue and refine her education in arts with a strong focus on set design. She then graduated with a Master’s Degree in scenography and entered the professional world shortly after with a strong work ethic. Two years later, she founded
Bowerbird Creation, a small design agency where she worked for three years.
There, they often collaborated with prestigious luxury brands such as Christian Dior, Lancome, and Giorgio Armani, producing original displays for cosmetic and perfume launches which could be seen in some of the most famous Parisian stores. During that time, her creations were the object of many publications in fashion magazines such as
Marie-Claire,
ELLE magazine FR and
Papier Maché. Sarah came to New York for the first time in 2011 and immediately connected with the creative spirit of the city. It was there that she met Neil Beloufa for the first time. Neil is one of the top ten contemporary artists of his generation In 2014, Neil Beloufa created his first feature film called “Occidental” and choose Sarah to design and direct the set. She worked for almost two years on this project, critically acclaimed in every festival where it has been shown (
TIFF,
Berlinale International Film Festival,
New York Film Festival, etc.). In 2015, her personal work was exhibited at the collective exhibition
C’est la Vie curated by Neil Beloufa, alongside fifteen other emerging artists. In 2016, Sarah was chosen among hundreds of other talented designers to design the Shiseido – Ginza store in Tokyo as part of the cherry blossom festival . Right after, Sarah moved to New York City in September 2016 and got her own studio. She is working on her first solo show, coming next fall.
For more information about Sarah visit her website here, or follow her on Instagram.
