French painter Xavier Hiquet recently saw ‘Om Shanti Om’ and with accented English and whirlwind gestures, he conveys his exuberant response to the film. “I enjoyed it! The colours, the 70’s sets, the music and Shahrukh Khan. I think, he is a very good man!’’ he says.
One can greet this effusive statement with superciliousness or indulgence but Xavier Hiquet needs neither. He travels through life with an open mind and a lot of curiosity. He reacts to everything. To the world and its bustling cities and bazaars, its people, its various cultures and when he cannot contain his joy, he paints.
His paintings are like random notes in the diary of a globe-trotter. They evoke restaurant menus, ticket stubs, pamphlets in exotic languages, posters in tropical colours, traffic signs and bill boards that fill up the senses of a traveller as he/she backpacks through undiscovered lands with wide eyes.
Pop art elevated to iconic heights by Andy Warhol has said tongue-in-cheek things about the world we live in and Xavier is possibly not the only artist to be inspired by the master. His art does not qualify for an intellectual examination but it is guileless, spontaneous and entertaining, a lot like the cinema he enjoys. It is a montage of images and colours and happy memories.
Xavier was in Bangalore some time back to showcase his works, ‘Voyages’ and his paintings displayed on the stucco walls of the restaurant revealed his eye for leaping stimuli and also the imprint of advertising symbolism. His India impressions were conveyed with Aishwarya Rai’s visage, Bollywood and kitch art found in trucks and autos.
The Australian Outback was summed up with images of Flying Doctors and Kangaroos and beer cans. There were similar painted postcards from Lisbon, Kyoto, Shanghai, Kenya, Maldives. Did the wander lust come first or the art? He says, “Travelling is just a pretext to paint and vice versa. I like both. For me, a place is a visual thing and I respond visually to it. I work in an advertising company so I am sensitive to symbols and they find their way in my work. There are things which are typical to a place. I filter them through a modern viewpoint and paint them. For instance, Shanghai can be summed up by painting a simple rice bowl. Of course, Warhol is the master and everyone is influenced by him but am also influenced by abstract painters and the Impressionists. My art is about communicating creatively.’’
Of his India experience, he says, “I travelled through Kerala, Chennai, Mumbai, Pondicherry. India is full of colours and life. Even the light is different here. The sun sets earlier here than it does in Europe. India has everything. Silence and bustle. And of course, the films! I have watched ‘Monsoon Wedding’, ‘Lagaan’. Satyajit Ray is very big in France. I like Shahrukh's acting and everyone knows about Aishwarya Rai! In India, each place is different from another. It’s a big country with many small countries inside it. It will take me a long time to know it fully.’’ Till then Xavier Hiquet will continue to paint.
