Paper, from humble material to luxurious artwork
At first glance, paper seems to be one of the simplest materials imaginable. Light, silent, and discreet, it often evokes the ephemeral, the forgettable. And yet, in the hands of artists, this humble medium is elevated to the status of a precious object. It becomes artwork, sculpture, landscape, even architecture. Paper is not merely a support, it is a living, vibrant substance, rich with memory and endless possibilities.
Born from plant fibers, paper carries within it an organic quality. It breathes, folds, crumples, cuts, and layers. Its ability to capture and reflect light, to absorb or diffuse its subtleties, makes it deeply responsive to its surroundings. Each paper-based work is a play of delicate tensions, between fragility and strength, emptiness and substance, silence and intensity.
Contemporary artists are reclaiming this material with renewed virtuosity. Some use it as a canvas for fine graphic or calligraphic gestures. Others sculpt, pierce, laminate, or assemble it into monumental installations. In every case, paper becomes the ground for a tactile poetry, a controlled gesture, a deeply artisanal savoir-faire.
Over the years, we have had the privilege of collaborating with many artists who explore this medium, among them Anne Feat Gaiss, a French artist whose artwork transcends the boundaries between art, science, and spirituality. In her creations, she combines noble materials such as paper, copper, silver, and gold, shaped through refined techniques like marouflage, painting, incision, and oxidation. Often created on traditional Indian paper, her compositions unveil fluid, poetic forms imbued with light.
We’ve also had the pleasure of working with Antonin Anzil, whose artwork is defined by extraordinary delicacy. For him, paper becomes sculpture, a sensitive terrain where reliefs, textures, and patterns emerge point by point. Under his meticulous hand, this humble material acquires an almost tactile presence. His artworks, both fragile and powerful, evoke lace, decorative arts, or imagined landscapes, quiet invitations to contemplation.
Continuing our exploration of paper, Claire Trotignon’s artworks offers a singular and captivating perspective. The artist approaches paper as a space for research, architectural, graphic, and poetic. Through drawing, cutting, and collage, she assembles fragments of old engravings, drawn lines, reserves, and strokes of acrylic, composing pieces where landscapes, cartography, and structure merge. By deconstructing traditional perspective and linear narrative, she creates images suspended in their own space-time. Each piece explores a balance between precision and emptiness, order and dispersion. She constructs prismatic worlds where temporal and spatial references blur, inviting the eye to wander through layered drawings. Here, paper becomes a space of construction, memory, and imagination.
This quiet refinement naturally finds its place in the world of interior architecture. Whether in a hotel, a residential setting, or an institutional space, a paper-based work can shift the perception of a wall, play with the shadows of changing light, and introduce a subtle rhythm that resonates with surrounding materials. Far from the spectacular, it is a discreet form of luxury that expresses itself, the luxury of rare material, of measured gestures, of restrained emotion.
At Durst Art Consultancy, we select these works with the highest standards, favoring artists who push the limits of this millennia-old material. Through these collaborations, we bring paper into exceptional spaces, where it reveals its full potential: to transform simplicity into elegance, and the ordinary into the extraordinary.
