Jacqueline H-Botquelen

Watching but not being able to see through. One that imbues the most fragile features of these works with an oppressive timelessness. To convey the fraction of a second when you are confronted with a maelstrom of primal emotions, before you become aware of them.

This series began when our world was shut down by a virus called Covid. Eyes became an obsession and awakened in me the forgotten memories of my childhood. 

It is a dialogue between figurative work on self-made paper laid on canvas and abstract creation, with glass sculptures on paper, fused in sand, 2 different techniques for the same theme. The previous moment, frozen and ephemeral, the human emotion it contains or the creation of a galaxy.

"Jacqueline H-Botquelen, oscillates between reflexive opacity and transitive transparency, an unreasoning narrative space where materials and mediums communicate in aesthetic coherence and unexpected alterity."  Veronica CUOMO

In the Primeval II series, the bold colours invite a discourse on what lies behind or beneath the surface of each individual. How do we deal with the unspeakable? Pierce the dark matter? Struggle to pass through the "event horizon" and overcome the emotional numbness in order to be alive again?

For Charles Baudelaire, the work of the poet is to transcend Evil to find “Beauty”, as he wrote in his book “The Flower of evil” (“Les fleurs du mal”), thinking that we can only achieve it, through the state of mind called spleen, which is death and destruction.

Jacqueline H-Botquelen takes us into an inner world where our primal being is built to survive, open to a state of resilience, seeding hope and beauty in its path.

"Melancholy is the glorious companion of beauty; it is so good that I cannot conceive of any beauty that does not carry its sadness within it."