Bruno Bressolin is a Parisian artist best known for his distinctively dreamlike paintings, his bold illustrations, his imaginative sculptures made of found objects, and his large scale illustrated books. I was intrigued when he began presenting a series of illustrated ceramic plates on Instagram during the Covid-19 confinement, so in April, I contacted him. The following interview took place by email last week.

Peggy Roalf: This 20/20 project in ceramics seems like a major departure from your already diverse studio practice in painting, sculpture, and books as art objects. Does the title refer to the year of its production?

Bruno Bressolin: Well yes, of course but it is also, for the French, the indication of a high grade in school. Those are the obvious meanings, but the name is more so a veiled critique of the 2.0, digital generation, where nothing is solid and there is no original. I wanted to use ceramics to rediscover this primary gesture of humanity, as our early human ancestors did, creating art on utilitarian objects.   
PR: This is what sparked the inspiration to paint on plates?
BB: For many years I had imagined painting on plates. Just before the Covid-19 confinement I was at the studio of a friend who is a ceramics artist and I tried out a few ideas on the surface of some bisque just for fun. When the Covid hit and we were forced to "restez chez vous", I noticed that even in quarantine, the subject of conversation would still naturally gravitate toward talking about our meals. This is one of the most interesting French obsessions in my opinion, and I wanted to create a body of work to celebrate this, as well as to express a few other ideas I had been ruminating about.  

PR: How many plates have you made?
BB: I have created more than 50 unique plates since confinement began. It was the hope that when the confinement was over there would be grand scale celebrations (as is the custom) and I had hoped to debut the collection in a banquet with friends and family to celebrate our new-found freedom. Of course, we are still can't gather in large groups, and the momentum of such a celebration has nearly vanished so there will need to be another reason to set a big table.
PR: I know many artists found the surreality of the epidemic, and the absence of outside distractions beneficial for their art. Was this also the case with you?
BB: To be honest, I found it a really disastrous time for inspiration with so much pain and suffering all over the world.

PR: But you were so productive during this time; was it just business as usual for you?  
BB. It was an interlude, an unknown period just to create without the pressure of having to produce. I used the state's endowment to purchase new supplies and equipment and was able to freely produce for my own enjoyment.
PR: Have you worked in ceramics before?
BB: This was my first time, but not my last. There is an element of mystery in this kind of creation that I find truly intriguing. In ceramics, when you paint, you don't see the true color until after the work is fired. It is such an exciting moment when you finally get to see what was baked. It was pretty amazing because many of the plates I made in confinement waited literally months to be fired, so I had almost forgotten what I had done. I plan to buy a kiln so I can create more freely, and then I can experiment with "La Part du Feu", which is a time of luck, as well as science (or could it be alchemy?).

PR:  Do you envision these for actual use, or would you rather they be used solely for display?  
BB: Oh, I certainly want people to use them as everyday objects.  
PR: And they are all painted on both sides; why use the side nobody looks at for so much of the art?
BB: There is an old custom in France that at the end of lunch people would flip the plate over to use for their dessert. I painted the reverse as a reference to this but also to add a little surprise, a little mystery hidden beneath.  
PR: Though this work is stylistically modern, the thematic direction leans towards ancient Greece. Due to the durability of the pottery, and the large-scale production of utilitarian items, much of what we know about ancient Greek society has been gleaned from the remains of Aegean pottery. It makes me wonder: was this work a conscious, or perhaps subconscious desire, to create something permanent in a time of great insecurity.

BB: Indeed, there is an element of wanting to create an archeology of XXI. Perhaps if the future owner breaks a plate, he or she would hold onto, or even hide the shards as contemporary relics for future generations to find. I chose the theme of "new antique gods", like Plato, Homer, Socrates. When I read Plato today, I see the signs sent from the past and I try to transcribe them into the art using my own interpretation and style. It sets out in graphic terms the condition of man's access to knowledge of the "good" in the metaphysical sense of the word, as well as the transmission of this knowledge. I sometimes change the primary meaning, but just slightly.
PR: And many of the plates are inscribed with words beginning with "poly". I see polystyrene, polypropylene, polyphosphate, polydortmund, polymer, malpoly. What is this about?
 BB: They are my new gods in this crazy plastic world. PRinterview

Bruno Bressolin on Instagram: @bressolin

Website: http://brunobressolin.com/fr/accueil.html

In DART here and here

Ed. note: Special thanks to Sher Katz, in Montpellier,  for editorial assistance