Bernadette Chéné

Bernadette Chéné was born in 1947, she lives and works in France.

Drawing on the heritage of Minimalism and Arte Povera, Bernadette Chéné uses simple materials to exploit their formidable plastic qualities. She resolutely keeps ornament at a distance to encourage listening and subtle perception. Bernadette Chéné cultivates simplicity not only in her materials, but also in her forms: she uses primary geometry, circles, triangles, columns and pyramids to reveal the essence of things. She is regularly invited by museums and art centres to create monumental installations based on the same principle. Her work can be found in numerous public and private collections.

“Bernadette Chéné delights in the transformation of sculpture brought about by the avant-gardes of the second half of the twentieth century, deliberately following in their footsteps. From Minimal Art she takes the modular element and the serial principle, from Arte Povera her attention to the dialectic between nature and culture, from the Supports/Surfaces movement her desire to test the mechanisms of sculpture, from Process Art her desire to efface herself in favour of the material”. Gaëlle Rageot-Deshayes, Heritage Curator.

Art3 has recently published the artist’s first comprehensive monograph, which you can buy in our Eshop