First of all hello! welcome if you're just arriving, and great pleasure to find you still here, OG fan since the 2017 and 2018 Puces Pop... or from my collection launch at Les Faiseurs in 2019 . I consider this my turning point, with this collection that has become signature, with the dreamy nerikomi peachy landscapes. That's when I really started to believe I could make a viable career out of it. Those years changed my life completely... When I made my first Puces Pop in december 2017, I was on welfare because I could no longer do my previous job due to very intense physical pain caused by a rare congenital disease: villonodular synovitis. Basically, it's a chemical imbalance in the lubricant of a joint; in my case, it's in my left ankle. It produces tumors, osteophyfitis, and destroys the cartilage. At that point I was waiting to receive surgery, which I had a few months later at the end of winter 2018... It took almost a full year of rehabilitation to be able to walk more than 10 minutes without crutches.
With the chronic pain I was in at that time, I didn't believe in my ability to create an economically viable ceramic business... and then I couldn't go back to my old job (in a hotel kitchen). It was a very difficult time psychologically, doctors didn't even beleive that i would eventually walk normally again... But I had a lot of encouragement from people close to me... my family, Arnaud, my friend Véro... I had a social safety net that gave me the courage to take the plunge. I went looking for a studio and found a shared spot in the ''Chat des Artistes'', a building just a few steps from where I was living at the time, so it felt safe to me close from home when I had spikes of pain.
In 2019, I was a beneficiary of the Soutient au Travail Autonome program, which offered a grant and training for 1 year, and allowed me to develop my techniques and artistic language without worrying about sales... It saddens me that this program no longer exists, I don't know if I could have made it this far without it. That's when I launched the collection that introduced me to a wider public at Les Faiseurs, a great café/pottery school in Montreal's Villeray district, with whom I still collaborate today! and Cybèle B.P. and I created the Roche Papier craft show concept, that was reconduct by Atelier Retailles 2 years later.
In 2020 I was a finalist for the Prix Jean-Cartier with this piece, and began developing slip decorating with the pastry bag.
2021 was a year of great upheaval! I had to find a new studio because I couldn't stay where I was, but I got SO lucky: a space became available after only 2-3 months of searching, in the same building! So I only had to move my stuff a floor up! and then I created a playground studio designed from A to Z for the specific needs of my practice with colored clays and teaching, with the precious help of my uncle Olivier for building. By the way, thanks to all those who took part in the studio fundraising campaign! and of course to my colleagues who donated products to help me build amazing gift baskets for the campaign!
1 year later my home building was on sale by the owners and I had to move. I found my current apartment in the fall of 2022... All these upheavals transformed my life for the better, but it was so much work, so much mental and physical effort and so many insecurities, that when everything was settled and balance returned, my system kind of shutted down... I've had more or less a year in the slow lane, looking back I can say that I burned out. I feel like I'm back on track but I don't know if could ever work at the same pace as theses early career building years.
In 2022 I began collaborations with Etty from YYY ceramics and in 2023 I was a guest artist at the New Clay Conference in Ottawa. *And I burned out*. In 2024 I did my first creative residency in the U.S. at Watershed and received my first grant from the Conseil des Arts et Lettres du Québec.
In 2025 I'll be doing my first teaching contracts outside Quebec; next July: in Edmonton, Calgary and at the Medalta Center in Medicine Hat! It's amazing how far I've come from where I am today, and how far away my life seemed 6 years ago when I first set out to make ceramics my full-time career!
I'd like to thank all of you who have believed in me and appreciated my art. I've had a lot of help on many levels to get here; from the ceramics community and makers community at large, from institutions, friends, family, and of course all of you who have been following my journey, whether for years or just a few days! My greatest wealth in life is us! Thank you 10 000 times!!!