Jeanne Vicerial, the young French textile artist, has a new show at Galerie Templon where she unveils the result of two years spent exploring the notion of metamorphosis.
For the Nymphose exhibition, Vicerial fills the gallery’s original space in Rue Beaubourg in Paris with her Présences, the large sculptures in crocheted or smoothed black thread that are so characteristic of her practice. The show is an ode to transformation in all its facets. Vicerial depicts it in various forms: as an awakening of the material, illustrated by the work in tribute to Pierre Soulages where the beyond-black thread stretched taut on the canvas suddenly flows in waves to the floor; as artistic creation via a process of exploration and experimentation, the process that precedes the nascent work, and as the gestation that is exclusive to viviparous beings.
Silent Présences watch the visitor in a room transformed into what could be a private bedroom or holy chapel, draped in black, the lighting subdued. Engrossed in a romantic embrace, in the middle of giving birth or living out their twilight years, they seem to be in the grip of a transition. Like a moment frozen in time, Vicerial attempts to capture the transformation paving the way to the (re)birth of these unclassifiable beings, these supernatural nymphs, half-plant, half-animal.
“Our environment abounds in these metamorphoses,” she explains. “My thread turns into a cocoon right in front of my eyes, and a sculpture emerges from it. Everything undergoes transformation.” Alongside them is a wall featuring small Sex-votos made from a single, ink-coloured thread. For the first time, the artist has inlaid them with nuggets of bronze and fine gold. The objects-as-offerings beg the question, what exactly do they evoke? Female genitals? Insects? Extraterrestrial bodies? These enigmatic creatures highlight a great taboo of society: the fear of the passing time, of change, of decline, vulnerability and death.
Born in 1991, Jeanne Vicerial lives and works in Paris. After studying costume design then obtaining a master’s in clothes design at the Paris École des Arts Décoratifs in 2015, she obtained a Sciences, Arts, Creation and Research PhD in 2019, the first in France. She took this research further as she questioned the made-to-measure/ready-to-wear dichotomy while choosing an artistic path which led her to found research and design studio Clinique vestimentaire. In addition to producing her own creations, she has established an array of partnerships with artists working in different fields. Her work has been widely shown, including at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris (2018), Villa Medici and Palazzo Farnese in Rome (2020), Collection Lambert in Avignon (2021), Magasins Généraux in Pantin (2021) and Basilique Saint-Denis (2022) and was recently included in the Centre National des Arts Plastiques collection in Paris as well as the FRAC Auvergne collection. In 2024 she was invited to exhibit her work alongside paintings by Pierre Soulages at the Musée Soulages in Rodez.
Jeanne Vicerial’s work has featured in several group exhibitions, including at the Maximiliansforum, Munich (2022), Fondation Martell, Cognac (2022), Ballroom Project, Antwerp (May 2022), Maison Guerlain, Paris (2022), Musée International des Arts Modestes in Sète (2023), Lafayette Anticipations – Fondation Galeries Lafayette, Paris (2023), FRAC Auvergne (2023), Musée Bargoin, Clermont-Ferrand (2023) and the Nîmes Triennale (2024).
In 2022, she created the sets for Atys, a new version of the tragic opera composed by Jean-Baptiste Lully and inspired by Ovid’s Metamorphosis, directed by Angelin Preljocaj and shown for the first time in France at the Versailles Royal Opera.
In 2023, Jeanne Vicerial made the costumes for Figures by Dalila Belaza at the Théâtre de la Cité Internationale. Jeanne Vicerial’s first monograph was published in 2023 with a special contribution from philosopher Emanuele Coccia and interview with historian and researcher Ida Soulard.
From 19 June to 7 September 2025 as part of the Le Voyage à Nantes event, Jeanne Vicerial’s work will be presented interacting with a text by French philosopher and writer Claire Marin at Lieu Unique in Nantes.
Templon Paris: 30 rue Beaubourg 75003 Paris, France
Photos: Courtesy of Templon Gallery
www.templon.com/exhibitions/pupation
@galerietemplon
www.jeannevicerial.com
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