Comme des enfants
Sebastien Montel Sebastien Montel

Comme des enfants

Three children stand together, unselfconscious and genuine. Their closeness represents something we often lose as adults: the ability to love and connect without precondition. Children are blind to the labels that later separate us, race, class, education, difference. They see with their hearts, not their categories.

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Comme des sœurs
Sebastien Montel Sebastien Montel

Comme des sœurs

While Comme des frères explores the barriers men face in expressing emotion, Comme des sœurs reflects the opposite: the openness, empathy, and mutual recognition often seen among women. Their expressions are not performative. They’re contemplative, grounded in compassion and self-awareness.

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Comme des frères
Sebastien Montel Sebastien Montel

Comme des frères

This piece challenges what it means to be male in a world that still asks men to withhold tenderness. Too often, society confines masculinity within narrow borders: strength without softness, pride without vulnerability, presence without emotion. With Comme des frères, I wanted to paint something different, a visual permission slip for men to feel, to reach out, to care.

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Texture as Memory: Why I Layer Surfaces in My Work
Sebastien Montel Sebastien Montel

Texture as Memory: Why I Layer Surfaces in My Work

As a contemporary expressionist painter, I use texture to evoke depth, not just visual, but emotional. It’s a record of feeling. Beneath each visible layer lies another, hidden one. Some are scraped away, others remain buried, just as memory fades or transforms over time.

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The Power of Gesture in Contemporary Art
Sebastien Montel Sebastien Montel

The Power of Gesture in Contemporary Art

In contemporary art, gesture is a form of communication, a direct link between emotion and action. When I paint, every mark carries intention, whether it’s a bold sweep of the brush or the faint trace of hesitation. Those gestures, to me, are confessions.

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Collectors and Connection: Why Stories Matter in Art Purchases
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Collectors and Connection: Why Stories Matter in Art Purchases

Art collecting has always been more emotional than transactional. People rarely buy a painting simply because it matches a wall, they buy it because it stirs something within them.

Over time, I’ve come to see that what truly connects a collector to a piece isn’t the subject or technique; it’s the story.

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French Roots, Californian Light: How Place Shapes My Palette
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French Roots, Californian Light: How Place Shapes My Palette

France taught me stillness. I grew up surrounded by muted light and architecture that seemed to breathe with history. The air carried a quiet melancholy, an awareness of time passing, of stories lingering in the texture of walls and streets. That sensitivity formed the foundation of my work. My early paintings were introspective, rooted in shadow and restraint.

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