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Inès Longevial, a Sensitive Painter
Inès Longevial’s paintings look light and casual, but they are like plunging into a subtle, very coloured and sometimes provocative world. On her canvases, in a mix of blurred lines and forms, Inès creates faces with intense looks, where the curves of a body explore the human with a lot of poetry. No contours and no shades in her creations, where the gently mixed colours make us feel like we are in a suspended time. It makes us want to look again at these bodies which stare at us. Inès paints her coloured visions on any medium and always with the same energy. A collection of short-lived tattoo sketches, a scarf with Amélie Pichard, collaborations with Nike, Fred Perry and others… Her art tells us a lot, and besides her work as a painter, she is also an illustrator and keeps collaborating with great people and brands she carefully chooses. A refreshing artist you must absolutely know.
Location
Paris
Author
Eve Campestrini
Photographer
Eve Campestrini
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TSF
Inès, how did you start painting?
Inès
It comes from my childhood. I’ve always painted. I kept drawing, all the time, I loved it. My mother, who painted as well, encouraged me. She used to take me to exhibitions. Except for a period when I was hesitating between being a cosmonaut and a fashion designer, I’ve always wanted to do this. I studied graphic design and applied arts, and I’ve always worked in illustration – painted of course.
TSF
Can you tell us how you arrived in Paris?
Inès
It has been two years now and one thing led to another quite quickly. A friend, who is an illustrator, introduced me to the team of a new bar in Pigalle, “L’Isolé”. We were doing a poster each month, and also invitations, etc. I painted something different every time, on the theme of love and sensuality. That’s when it all began and, little by little, I had more orders and collaboration offers.
TSF
How did you choose these collaborations?
Inès
It’s hard to choose because I would like to do nothing but paint. It’s currently fascinating because a lot of things are happening, I got a lot of proposals, but I realise, maybe for the first time, the choices I have to make. I’m very careful so that, in the future, I do only what I want and that I don’t work on things I haven’t truly desired. This idea of doing myself a product, a brand, this “self-promotion” which enables to work, can also have a perverse effect. I try to choose only brands and people I like, according to what I’m taken with, because giving its image and credit to these names do matter. Until now, I’ve worked with amazing brands and people.
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I think it’s hard, and not always pleasant, to define oneself. But there must be something romantic in my painting.
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TSF
Can you tell us about your style and your way of working?
Inès
I think it’s hard, and not always pleasant, to define oneself. But there must be something romantic in my painting. I paint with oil and I use a lot of flat tints. With a lot of red and pink these days, because I worked a lot on skins and its shades. I paint a lot of humans, nudes and flowers. I first sketch so I find the right lines and the expression I like. I like spending a long time painting, isolated during several days without seeing anyone. It’s the way I work: some intense periods of work and quieter moments. For now, I work home in Paris or I go to my parents’ in the Basque Country.
TSF
What does influence you?
Inès
When it comes to painting, I’m inspired by classic things, which remind me of my childhood: Rodin, Camille Claudel, Picasso. Well, the basis. And then, every artistic movement. I pick through painters. Cinema is also an endless source of inspiration. If I had to talk about just one, I’d say Almodovar and the colours he uses – it’s fascinating. One of Frida Khalo’s sentences inspires me a lot: the one in which she talks about the topics of her work, says that the one she knows the best is herself, and that, as a consequence, she is becoming the topic/medium. It’s a bit the same for me. Painting is like a medium that enables me to show what I feel. A release place. For example my collection of self-portraits came from a time when I didn’t paint a lot, during which I wanted to stay in bed all the time. I worked on blankets, fabrics, like ties to untie. I think I form mental pictures a lot. I feel everything we can say about painting is very cliché. There is something lasting, like a mark you leave behind yourself.
TSF
Which decoration element is essential to you?
Inès
Flowers! I love them in a home, even more since my moving in Paris. After a childhood in the countryside, I quickly realised how this was part of me. Sometimes, you feel a bit tight in Paris.
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