2016

Elsa Guillaume

"My work is nurtured by travel stories, explorations, discoveries. "


Travel diaries

Elsa Guillaume : artiste en résidence sur tara

Born in 1989, in Carpentras, Elsa Guillaume graduated from the Beaux-Arts de Paris, and won the 2015 Coal Prize. She was the first artist-in-residence on the Tara Pacific expedition, aboard the schooner from September (Easter Island) to October 2016 (Papeete, Tahiti).

Elsa Guillaume

During her residency, she created a travel diary with daily sketches, notes and anecdotes which were later used to do her “Coral Cosmography” project. This is a large drawn map, inspired by ancient nautical charts known as « portulans ».  

“It’s curiosity that motivates me to listen and read these stories, but also to travel alone with my sketchbook, observe the world and its oddities. I started diving at the same time as ceramics, in 2010 … these were two strong aesthetic shocks that profoundly changed my artistic work, and my way of perceiving the seabed.

Aboard Tara I discovered real navigation via the mythical islands and archipelagos of the Pacific. My cartographic project, imagined before this adventure, will be accompanied by new ceramic pieces inspired by the expedition. This is technical material in ceramic, for underwater and utopian travel.”

Elsa Guillaume

[ TaraPacific ] Travel Diaries

[ TaraPacific ] Travel Diaries

Elsa Guillaume

Discover some of Elsa’s creations inspired by life aboard Tara:

Œuvre d'Elsa Guillaume : Carnets Coralliens
Coral Diaries, Artist’s book — 100 copies published in 2017 ©Elsa Guillaume
Œuvre d'Elsa Guillaume : Triplekit
Triplekit – View of the AMPHIBIE exhibition at the Galerie Catherine Bastide, Marseille, 2019 (Photo credit: Jean-Christophe Lett)

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