Temporary Surface
Robin Curtil

Temporary Surface documents the last two years of work by French artist Robin Curtil. Influenced by living and working in New York, cultural differences inform Curtil’s artistic practice, allowing him to develop his painting in an international context. Including oil paintings on canvas and paper, this solo exhibition highlights the process of painting as a sensitive language and the canvas as a space for poetic experimentation. The visible result of Curtil’s research is presented in fragments, and the resulting paintings appears as much as affirmations than proposals in the form of open questions. As Robin Curtil works in his studio, he seeks to induce this moment of astonishment that occurs unexpectedly – it is in the act of painting itself that Curtil finds the driving force of his practice. He does not construct a painting beforehand; instead, the final image comes to him progressively through a process of search between control and loss of control. Processes of layering, repeating and erasing culminate to reach the moment when the painting finally appears. In constant metamorphosis and elusiveness, the oil disguises itself and takes on multiple appearances.

About the Artist 

Robin Curtil is a French painter graduated from Superior School Art Design of Saint-Etienne (ESADSE, France). He lives and works in New York, NY. In 2022, Robin Curtil was selected to join the NYFA’s Immigrant Artist Program of the New York Foundation for the Arts. He also participated in a group exhibition at ChaShaMa Space (NYC), Live Arts New York (NYC) and at Launch F18 Gallery’s Viewing Room (NYC). Robin has participated in several residencies and was artist in residence in 2021 at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Lyon, France. His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally at venues such as the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of Saint-Etienne (France) during the 2020 Art Press biennale, organized by the Art Press magazine. His work has been also exhibited at the 4th Wuhan biennale (China, 2017), at the Ceysson&Benetiere Gallery (Saint-Etienne, France, 2017) and at the French Institute of Sphax (Tunisia, 2016),