Born in Montluçon, in central France, this talented self-taught man deliberately chose our own south to set up his easel after years of cheerful galleys on the Côte d'Azur. A painter of renown and adoration, his contemporary expressionism is fashionable in many galleries and international exhibitions around the world. Unpretentious and with their hearts in their hands, Tristan and his partner Monika welcome him to their simplest house in the world, at tea time, while they receive the Indian artist Jairaj Soni, collected in Rajasthan during the last trip.
Increasingly, Le Carla-Bayle acquires the appearance of an art village that the Arts et Vie association, organizer of the Rue des arts, would like to give it. Every year he sees his share of openings of small galleries and artists' studios. Thus, the painter Tristan Rà opens to the public his beautiful house in blue tones at the southern entrance of the bastide. It is probably the most visited place in the village, after the church and the inns. Tristan Rà was created in 1998, in the Carla-Bayle, a base port to which he invariably returns after each of his many trips from which he always brings back a formidable harvest of images and prints that make all the richness of his paintings.
Tristan Rà travels a lot through the countries that inspire him. Mainly in the East and Middle East, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Africa, Tunisia and Mali.
His talent is recognized today all over the world. He exhibits in the largest galleries: New York, Miami, Singapore, Hong Kong and of course Paris
Tristan Rà presented some of the thirty paintings he has composed in the last ten years: the Blue Mosque of Istanbul, views of Venice and Jerusalem, portraits of Urdu, people from the Afghan-Pakistani border.
He defines himself as a "modern orientalist" painter with an "expressionist" style.
The richness and color palette, from deep blue to reds and ochres, seduce visitors to the exhibition, as do the works of other artists, watercolors, pencils, oils, pastels, Indian inks, zinc, poetry and sculptures.
Tristan Rà was not born a painter, he certainly always drew but embarked on medical studies before, overnight, to throw everything away for painting
I enrolled in Fine Arts, but we learned an extremely laborious technique.
. I moved to Vallauris where I met a teacher I worked with.
Thirty years ago, Tristan Rà worked in oil painting "for the subtlety of the colors" but acrylic now allows him to go further in the subtlety of the enamel, the representation of the object fades behind the color medium and the movement of the line.
On his easel, it is under the benevolent gaze of Picasso that he officiates,
"pure genius!" according to Rà.
"I lived in Vallauris for a long time, I often met him without daring to approach him [...]
The presence of these great painters then imprinted in these places an atmosphere that encouraged creation."
Ramatuelle, Gassin, Collioure, at first painted ports, villages where he stayed, the overwhelming heat of the south but also the cold color of the island of Ré or the diffuse luminosity of the south of France and this small village of Ariège that reminds him so much of Saint Paul de Vence, with its high hills, its walls and galleries.
"Today I no longer have the pressure to produce several dozen paintings a month.
I have an important exhibition in Zurich in January and I work exclusively with galleries, in Germany, Switzerland, the United States and with my website "
I like color, I am close to German expressionists like August Macke and then Duffy, Matisse, Braque, Picasso or Gauguin who opened the doors to modern art"
The exhibition of Tristan Râ can be seen until August 31, 2021 at the Maison Jacob in Castelnau-Montratier in the Lot.
Oriental Expressionism
Colors are bright, bright but not aggressive, he went to iconic places on the Silk Road to create his own vision.
A journey that takes him to the East, where brushes and paintings under his arm is installed, in the street, in a place that inspires him to sketch the essence. Some paintings are worked with gold leaf, explains the artist "Some places deserve gold leaf like the paintings about Jerusalem. When I go to a country, I bring the canvas and paint on the street. This is the place that will take me. Depending on the place we do not have the same color palettes. Venice is very different from Sarmarkand. I can't take pictures of a place and go back to my painter's studio. I have to be inspired by the place, I have to relax, I have to smell the desert, the fog, the coffee next door, the spices. And then I know I have to settle there. That's where the color comes from. Smell gives me colors."
His Silk Road series does not mark all the stages, but the beginning with Venice and the end in hiva in Uzbekistan
Beautiful encounters
He likes to tell how this inspiration from the Silk Road was born: "in a rental in Venice, there were on the bedside table two books by Marco Polo, including the Devisement du monde that tells the story of his years of travels. It counts all the large and smaller stages with cities that no longer exist. The very evocative names of the cities he crossed, made me dream and gave me this desire to leave to do my Silk Road.
And when the artist moves to the street to paint, the natives are usually very interested in his work. He also does meetings, exchanges, talks a lot with his hands, his eyes, and many times he ends up making the portrait of the people who ask for it. "The portraits I made are, in fact, those who came to see me instinctively in their traditional attire for me to comb their hair."
