Olow x Geoffroy Pithon

It's Geoffroy Pithon's turn, a French painter whose work we've been following for a long time, to take over the playground of our spring-summer Blend Energy collection with a capsule of bucolic accents. He deploys his free and colorful universe, inviting you on a timeless journey. Through clothing and fabric, he creates landscapes between figuration and abstraction, inspired by an aquatic and geological nature, populated by imaginary plants.

Between "mad gardener" and "color artisan" as he calls himself, he envisions this collaboration as the wardrobe for this character. Nestled in La Montagne, a stone's throw from Nantes, he opens the doors of his home/studio, right on the Loire river. An opportunity to revisit his work and the universe of this collaboration that we are very proud to present today.

Can you introduce yourself in a few words?

I'm Geoffroy Pithon. I define myself as an artist, which gives me enough freedom to navigate between different practices.
Painting is my main medium; it allows me to explore many formats: installations, exhibitions, projects... it's super stimulating.

You started as a graphic designer. How did you transition to art?

I can't say exactly when it changed. Even back when I was making posters with the Formes Vives collective, I had a real interest in the pictorial question. There was a lot of room for all kinds of experimentation. Little by little, I started working by hand, drawing, painting... and it took up more and more space. After ten years in the collective, I wanted to open up, to step outside the framework of visual communication and move towards something freer, more personal.

Did you learn painting as a self-taught artist, notably by observing artists like Cy Twombly and others in action?

Yes. I didn't go to art school. I learned by tinkering, experimenting, and observing a lot. Books, videos, artists at work... that helped me validate an intuition I already had. Watching them allowed me to progress and permit myself certain things. The question of legitimacy arises quite quickly. Watching others do it made me realize that I could do it in my own way.

What are your influences?

It's always hard to make a list. There are inevitably essential artists like Matisse, Hockney, Bonnard, Sonia Delaunay or Nathalie Du Pasquier, especially for their relationship to color, which is central to my work. But my influences go far beyond painting. I draw a lot from music, cinema, writing, sport... It's a form of accumulation that nourishes my practice. I was a musician before being an artist, and I still am. There's a very strong link between the two, especially in the way of creating. Music is abstract by nature, and it has always seemed natural to me not to compartmentalize between figurative and abstraction.

Can you tell us about your creative process?

I work mainly on paper, and with paints that I make myself in the studio. The medium greatly influences my way of doing things; paper does not behave at all like canvas. It doesn't have the same rendering or the same effects. I use acrylic, which dries very quickly, allowing me to work at a fairly spontaneous pace. I paint in very different contexts, at a table on small formats, in my studio, or outdoors on large formats, sometimes in quite extreme conditions. More than a fixed process, it's a desire to paint everywhere, adapting to places, formats, and situations. I don't really work on specific subjects. I rather build a language, step by step. Color often comes first, and shapes follow.

You mentioned different formats, can you tell us about the Botanique Murmure project?

It's a series of about thirty small-format watercolors. I often say "at the table" because I work on them like a draftsman, which allows me to get a quick overall view. Usually, I work on a large scale, so I'm more immersed in the painting without immediate distance, my head in it. Here, on the contrary, I see the compositions appear more directly. Even if I talk about watercolor, the technique is a bit diverted. I don't work with the same paper, I have less of the watery effect; in fact, I use the watercolor cubes like gouaches, which allows me to have more material and precision. It's also a practical technique for reproducible projects, especially for scans or prints, while retaining a lot of detail. We can find many pencil marks that would tend to get lost more in my large-format work. That's kind of how I worked on one of the shirts for the collaboration. The print comes from a watercolor.

By the way, could you tell us about the genesis of some of the pieces or patterns in the collaboration?

In my work, the only somewhat figurative element is the plant. But I don't seek to represent real plants. Rather, they are forms that evoke them, stems, branches, things that can recall petals or trees. It's not a subject in itself; it's more of a gateway to abstraction. The plant world has something infinite about it; it allows me to build free images without completely losing sight of the viewer. For me, this universe encompasses much more than just plants. It can be landscapes, seabeds, organic forms... It's not necessarily something tangible; it's more of a sensation. At times, we think we recognize elements, precisely thanks to the stems, the rhythms they create. The petals, the leaves bring flat areas, overlapping forms. Nature remains a very generous playground in the way it can be interpreted. All of this comes from memories, from things seen, experienced, transformed. Nothing really comes from nowhere. I am very marked by what surrounds me. In the collection, we inevitably find some of this flow. I don't start from a precise inspiration. It's more a given moment in my journey, in my work, and the collaboration fits into that. At OLOW, there is also a real place for drawing. I went in that direction, even if it's not my main practice. There's also writing, which I use a lot in my work.

I write by hand, mainly for the shape of the letters, almost like a drawing. The meaning remains important, but it's primarily a question of rhythm and gesture.
I see it as an extension of drawing, another way of making shapes appear.

How did you find the balance between your universe and OLOW's?

In my work, the only somewhat figurative element is the plant. But I don't seek to represent real plants. Rather, they are forms that evoke them, stems, branches, things that can recall petals or trees. It's not a subject in itself; it's more of a gateway to abstraction. The plant world has something infinite about it; it allows me to build free images without completely losing sight of the viewer. For me, this universe encompasses much more than just plants. It can be landscapes, seabeds, organic forms... It's not necessarily something tangible; it's more of a sensation. At times, we think we recognize elements, precisely thanks to the stems, the rhythms they create. The petals, the leaves bring flat areas, overlapping forms. Nature remains a very generous playground in the way it can be interpreted. All of this comes from memories, from things seen, experienced, transformed. Nothing really comes from nowhere. I am very marked by what surrounds me. In the collection, we inevitably find some of this flow. I don't start from a precise inspiration. It's more a given moment in my journey, in my work, and the collaboration fits into that. At OLOW, there is also a real place for drawing. I went in that direction, even if it's not my main practice. There's also writing, which I use a lot in my work. I write by hand, mainly for the shape of the letters, almost like a drawing. The meaning remains important, but it's primarily a question of rhythm and gesture. I see it as an extension of drawing, another way of making shapes appear.

Finally, I'd like to revisit the entire collaboration, because some pieces were conceived from start to finish. Can you tell us about that?

Yes, and that's what's interesting. Some pieces started from sketches I made, then OLOW designed them. What I like is that it's not a direct transposition of my work into clothing. It's more a way of creating pieces that I would want to wear. I don't dress in paint, but in simpler, rawer things. There's a form of homage to workshop clothing, to workwear. With OLOW, it takes on another dimension, with more contemporary details, materials, embroideries, pockets, collars... A balance between simplicity and attention to detail.

Photographs: Nina Ducleux