When other children were scribbling with crayons or smearing finger-paints, Olivier Ferrieux was becoming best friends with color. As a little boy, the artist and writer remembers, he was shy and scared of ghosts. Red inspired him to be brave, sending a wave of courage through him. Orange, on the other hand, helped him regain his self-confidence after his father chided him for poor grades.
“Orange gave me the feeling that I could achieve my dreams, and I needed that as a teenager,” he says.
The France-born artist pays homage to his close relationship with colors in Couleurs (十顏十色), which was published last month. The book is divided into 10 chapters, each of which honors a particular hue with a prose poem in French and Chinese and Ferrieux’s distinctive, nuanced pen-and-watercolor illustrations.
An exhibition of Ferrieux’s artwork, including pieces from Couleurs, is on display at Alliance Francaise de Taiwan (台灣法國文化協會) at National Taiwan University through Oct. 31, and he will be performing at the Taipei Poem Festival (台北詩歌節) at Nanhai Gallery (南海藝廊) along with musician Arnaud Lechat on Nov. 16.
The seeds of Couleurs were planted when the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) approached Ferrieux last year to write a series of articles accompanied by illustrations, which now form the basis of the book. Ferrieux chose to write about colors, he says, because he had never written about the effect they had on him.
In Ferrieux’s personal spectrum, the attributes of colors become more complex as they move toward the cooler shades of the rainbow, in the way that children mature as they grown older. A little boy may draw on red for courage as he hides from ghosts, for instance, but blue’s strength is in nourishing hope and staying true to oneself. Purple, on the other hand, helps inspires the kind of self-confidence that allows you to in turn become more generous and openhearted. And while white is often viewed as the color of innocence and purity or of mourning in different cultures, Ferrieux sees it as a mirror: “It projects your feelings back to you. It is a peaceful color, but it will keep reflecting your feelings, and if you are unhappy it can be dangerous.”
Out of all the colors, Ferrieux now identifies the most with green, which he describes as a hue that allows you to transform feelings of loneliness into ones of quiet solitude. “To me, it is like when you are out walking without friends. You pluck a blade of grass and rub it into your fingers, and as the color sinks into your skin, you feel like you are releasing your emotions and becoming more carefree,” he says.
Ferrieux was born in 1963 near Lyon, France, where he studied fine art in university. In 1995 he left France for Taiwan “to breathe,” he says, and to indulge his love of Mandarin.
“I loved learning Chinese. It is very relaxing because writing the words are almost like drawing. Each character is like a person. Some are friendly and open, some are nervous and withdrawn, others are happy and carefree,” says Ferrieux, who at a recent book signing at Alliance Francaise drew each person’s Chinese name into an illustration featuring dachshunds with superlong bodies, soaring birds, grinning snails, plump clouds and other whimsical motifs.
Despite his training, Ferrieux’s art career in Taiwan did not take off until, driven by unemployment, he decided to start selling small, palm-sized paintings by the side of Hankou Street (漢口街). Ferrieux painted as he sat by his makeshift stall, drawing the attention of passersby, something that inspired him to start pairing words with the pictures.
“People would look over my shoulder and ask, ‘What is that?’ when I was working, so I started to make stories to go with the paintings,” says Ferrieux. “That was a great opportunity that I think can only have happened for me in Taiwan because in Paris most people wouldn’t do that. They would discreetly take a peek and then walk on.”
Ferrieux eventually started getting publicity for his artwork, including a cover story in Xfun, a design magazine, and from there on his career started to take off. Since then, he has written several books, including Couleurs, found steady work as an illustrator and exhibited in New York City, Lyon and Taipei. Ferrieux also created permanent art installations for two of Taipei’s underground walkways. One, near the Xinpu MRT Station (新埔捷運站), was completed in August, and features impish figures dancing along the arches that shelter each set of stairs. Another is a series of colorful mosaics in an underground alcove near the Lin Family Gardens (林家花園).
Ferrieux is currently working on a new book that will combine his artwork with his poetry. When he works, Ferrieux says, he writes in French and in Chinese first and then creates illustrations to fit his words. The process is sometimes difficult. “It’s like my hands don’t want to listen and write what my brain wants them to write sometimes,” he says. But when everything finally comes together, “It’s like my hands are dancing as I write across the page.”VIEW THIS PAGE
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