DNSEP Art

Presentation 

Among the diversity of contemporary practices, ESADSE’s "Artist!" option considers an artwork first and foremost as an artefact, or an "artistic fact". It is a constellation of thoughts, intentions, choices, references made by a subject and crystallised in a form. What is at stake therefore is the production of a form that has a powerful presence, whatever its technical and material characteristics. The approaches emphasise a desire to experience the world through a phenomenology of the senses. If an experience is singular, artistic approaches do not envisage the questions that arise in today’s world under an all-encompassing gaze, but from situations that involve unique perceptions that reflect the complexity of those situations and, often, the dialectical polysemy. This sensitive experience is manifested in the materiality of the work of course (in particular in painting or sculpture) but it also emerges in the writing process, in the various relationships to the image (pictorial, photographic, video) and digital devices. The artwork as experience can also translate into an intrinsic connection to the moment of exhibition, whether in in situ practices or performances. Finally, it takes fully on board the approaches where the search for a form or gesture works with elements from nature and the living world in a context where contemporary attention is focused on our environment, in all the meanings that the word ‘environment’ can cover.

The "Artist!" option at ESADSE is open to all types of practice that exist in contemporary creation and to all the hybrid versions of them. However, we can highlight three specific features of the teaching at the School, at the intersection of which all the current practices meet and which are what give the ESADSE Art option its specific identity:

• Picturality in all its forms: this obviously encompasses painting practices, historically a strong presence at ESADSE with numerous artists who have now gained real visibility having trained there, as well as teachers, artists and critics renowned in this field. More widely, it envisages the connections between material, surface, colour, gesture, history, extending further than the medium of paint, encompassing and going beyond the painting as an object: how can a sculpture, a photograph, a video or an installation, for example, have a "pictorial" dimension? This area benefits from numerous partnerships (FRAC Auvergne, Galerie Ceysson-Bénétière, etc.).
• Art and crafts: contemporary creation includes a resurgence of artistic practices that involve a craft dimension, such as ceramics, textiles, glass... This relationship has produced new sculptural forms but is also part of a wider desire to rethink the ways of doing things, the hierarchies and categories. This area relies heavily on the technical studios at ESADSE, which foster bridges with the Object Design course and draw on the School’s partnerships, in particular via the Arts and Crafts Today programme and its international links, which provide opportunities and facilitate the organisation of exchanges with partner Schools.
• The "arts of time": film-making, writing – as a material practice –, performance and sound creation are all part of the contemporary plastic creative arts and are claimed as such by many creatives. The quality of the teaching of film at ESADSE is reflected in the number of student films selected for the FID Marseille international film festival, and the creative writing course has enabled several students to win places on the master’s course in creative writing at Le Havre University.

Teaching

The "Artist!" option therefore offers a wide variety of opportunities, both in terms of the transmission of knowledge (theory classes, drawing, painting, photography, volume, performance, literature, film, and more) and in terms of the partnerships with external organisations (placements in different types of institution, participation in exhibitions, the chance to meet artists, cultural trips, talks, workshops, etc.).

The main aim of the teaching is to accompany the students on the path towards accomplishment. As the course progresses, students will begin to define themselves as future artists as they benefit from the support of teachers who are themselves active in the fields of art and/or criticism, without any pre-determined aesthetic being imposed.

The art student is therefore able to develop their own direction and a unique formal repertoire without being constrained by particular themes or references. The aim is to create a "praxology", a logic in the way they do things. This means developing a real form of know-how in which the eye, the brain and the hand work together in symbiosis.

3-6 month mandatory placement in France or abroad or a 1-semester exchange with a partner institution abroad.

Research-based learning

The LEM (Modernity Experimentation Laboratory) is the research structure for the "Artist!" option. It builds on these approaches. It is currently developing an area of research supported by a European grant in collaboration with five Schools in other countries (Brussels, Bratislava, Montreal, Porto, Tétouan) whose theme is Arts and Crafts Today, and which is studying the links between the historic English movement and its legacy in contemporary creation, with a particular focus on issues around craftsmanship, the hand/machine dialectic, political positioning, the relationship between model (formal and historic) and innovation. The LEM is also working on a second area of research focused on types of picturality, which has already given rise to exhibitions and publications. The lab hosts PhD students, co-supervising them with French and foreign universities, in particular the University of Quebec in Montreal. There is currently one student completing a PhD in partnership with Aix-Marseille University and another with the University of Quebec in Montreal (UQAM).

Some artists who are recent graduates of the Art course: Loïc Bonche, Jordan Madlon, Camille Pradon, Jonathan Pornin, Nadjib Ben Ali, Clémentine Chalançon, Robin Curtil, Nicolas Momein, Mylène Sanchez, Sarah Del Pino, Pierre Brunet…

Some well-known figures who have been recent guest speakers: Jean-Christophe Bailly, Mireille Blanc, François Boisrond, Nicolas Bourriaud, Claire Chesnier, Christophe Cuzin, Georges Didi-Huberman, Nicolas Feodoroff, Teresa Lanceta, Annie Lebrun, Thomas Lévy-Lasne, Gilles Lipovetsky, Sara MacKillop, Yves Michaud, Catherine Millet, Marylène Negro, Didier Semin…

Special partners

Musée d’art moderne et contemporain, Saint-Étienne Métropole
Manifesta, Lyon
Fonds régional d'art contemporain (FRAC) Auvergne, Clermont-Ferrand
Festival international de Cinéma Marseille (FIDMarseille)

Our degrees in pictures

Since 2012, at ESADSE we have been keeping a record of our graduates’ work, which you can browse here:

See DNSEP Art projects