Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Corinne Cotereau. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Corinne, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

Hello again, Last time we spoke I was writing a book. I didn’t mention it because I wasn’t sure where it would lead me. Expressing myself has always been easier with colors than words. Well, after a tremendous amount of work and many months later, my book is going to be published.

Les Éditions Albin Michel, a big publisher in France, will release “Providence Canyon” in France in April 2023.
Back in 2020, writing was a necessity for me. I had just moved to San Diego from France when the world shut down because of Covid. Like the rest of humanity, I was stressed out, incapable of really releasing my anguish through my art. I was 10 000 km away from my 20-year-old daughter and 6000 km away from my 18-year-old son, and I was supposed to let go, have faith in life and go with the flow.

Fortunately, life is full of surprises. Serendipity drove me to a new path. While I was looking for a place to camp in Anza Borrego, I found out about “the impossible railway” crossing the Carrizo gorge. It totally triggered my imagination. For months, I hid in a fictive world, writing. I was holding on to a quote from Flaubert that says : “You have to write for yourself above all, that is your only hope of creating something beautiful”.

Curiously, writing helped my creative journey in painting. Being published is a dream to come true. Finding out who you truly are at 52 is a blessing. San Diego is my lucky place and my second book is in progress.

Corinne, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I am a French native who has been living in San Diego since 2020 as mentioned previously.

I used to be a lawyer back in my thirties. My artistic sensibility caught up with me in California in 2006, during my first expatriation in the US. We camped in the Joshua Tree desert. Amazed by the natural beauty of the place, I decided to return to my first love: painting. I took classes at the “San Diego Art Department”. I discovered the basics of oil painting, freed myself from the figurative style and learned to indulge in my own creativity. At that time I had no idea that the desert would inspire me so much.

I am an encaustic painter, using only natural materials. Encaustic painting was practiced by Greek artists as far back as the 5th century B.C. The encaustic medium is made up of beeswax and dammar resin (a tree sap) melted together. They are then mixed with professional grade pigments to make the encaustic paint. All layers must be melted and fused together with a torch to create this beautiful sense of depth that you cannot get with any other medium. The paint can be opaque or translucent, allowing the viewer to look deep into the painting and the layers beneath.

The wax also maintains sculptural qualities, inviting marks, carving and texture. Even three-dimensional work is possible. Encaustic paint is best used on a rigid surface that is absorbent and heat resistant. Wooden supports are stable panels. Encaustic is a very stable and long-lasting medium.

I am proud to be part of “Entre Deux: An Artist’s Journey between Worlds”. An Art Exhibition at the Studio Door Gallery in San Diego.
Entre Deux is a collaborative art exhibition by four French artists, Geraldine Vergnet, Aymeric Rondeau, Pierre Bounaud and myself. We made the life-changing journey of relocating to California. Each of us will share our experience of an existence split between two continents. Where new roots are growing, where a new path is forged.
The exhibition runs October 4-29. Opening reception is October 15, 5-8 PM. I hope to see you there !

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

Creating art is not about making money, it is about connecting people to one another.

With colors and textures, I investigate, mend or revisit my own feelings. When one of my paintings is moving or touching a fellow human heart, I feel rewarded. It is even better when a total stranger shares their own vision that could be entirely different from mine.

Are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

I wish I had read this before 50 years-old : patience is everything !

“In this there is no measuring with time, a year doesn’t matter, and ten years are nothing. Being an artist means: not numbering and counting, but ripening like a tree, which doesn’t force its sap, and stands confidently in the storms of spring, not afraid that afterward summer may not come. It does come. But it comes only to the patient, who are there as though eternity lay before them, so unconcernedly still and wide. I learn it daily, learn it with pain to which I am grateful: patience is everything!”

Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

Contact Info:

• Website: http://www.corinnecotereau.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/corinneinbetween/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CorinneCotereau/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/corinnecotereau/

Image Credits
Credits photos @corinnecotereau