Valentin Ranger

Born in 1992, work and live in London. 

Formation  

2022/2023 -MA Royal College of Art in London Contemporary art Practice.

2018/2023 -MFA Fine Art School of Paris (Beaux arts de Paris) - winner Agnes B prize  

2011-2018 -Theater School and experiment in directing, performing in French Theater. 

Solo Shows 

Novembre 2023 - Invites Program Zabludowicz Collection : London

2024 - Mor Charpentier Gallery : Paris

Exhibition group shows

2023

- La Fab - Agnes B Foundation, Paris

- Mor Charpentier gallery, Paris group show “Failures”

- Pompidou Art Center, Beaubourg - Paris National Museum “Rituals”.

- Barcelona Can Felipa Art Visuals “Una Casa sense focés és com un cos sense sang » - Barcelone

- Sultana Gallery, Paris “Soft touch » group show.

- Ketabi Bourdet Gallery, Paris group show.

- French Institute, Madrid Emerige Prize

2022

- Emerige Prize “Revelation 2022” – group show Paris - Special Jury’s Prize

- La Fab Foundation Agnès B- Duo show Paris / Conference with Act up “Body, Society and Sexuality”

- Reiffer Art Initiative Prize, “Free Bodies”, group show Acacias Center-Numero Magazine.

-“Cosmogonias” Center of Art of Vitry sur Seine, Jean Collet Gallery duo show.

-“In the silence, we don’t know.” Dauphine Prize nominated – group show Paris.

- Super Zoom gallery, Miami show United States.

2021 

-Mac Val – National Art Center Collaboration with Act up.

-“Fantasmagoria” Super Zoom Gallery, Paris Group Show

-“Crush” Beaux arts Paris, Group show

2020 

-“Void Cabaret”- Frac ile de France – Art center of Paris Area. 

Publications

Beaux Arts magazine – 2022 “Artist to follow” journalist: Maylis Celeux Lanval Interview 

Numero Magazine – 2021 “The young French Scene” journalist: Matthieu Jacquet – Portrait

Prizes and Nominations

Winner Special Jury’s Prize – Emerige Mecenat Foundation 2022  

Winner Agnes B. Prize – La Fab Agnes B Foundation 2021 (Beaux-Arts Paris)  

Nominated “Young French Scene Prize” – Reiffer Art Initiative Foundation 2022 

Nominated "Dauphine Art Prize" - Paris

"At the turn of the 16th century, Dutch artist Hieronymus Bosch painted his celebrated oak panel The Garden of Earthly Delights, a triptych depicting the fundamental Biblical myths, from the creation of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden to the horrors reserved in hell for sinful souls. In this major work, humans, demons and giant animals abound in a lush environment, some caught in the grip of lust and gluttony, others of anger and punishment. Four centuries later, this abundance finds its echo in the work of the young French artist Valentin Ranger : though freed from the religious fervour of his Dutch predecessor, Ranger likewise gives pride of place to pleasure, desire and excess, his phantasmagorical world teeming with spermatozoa-shrubs, woman-heifers, phallic fruit and butterfly-men, all of whom coexist harmoniously to the point of physically merging in euphoric scenes entirely devoid of hostility.

Currently a student at Paris’s École des Beaux-Arts, Ranger happily describes the landscapes of his imagination as a “vast opera,” which isn’t so surprising given that he initially envisaged a career on stage. During his theatre training, Ranger first of all found the confidence he needed to accept himself as he was, before coming up against the limits of the human body and regretting the lack of diversity on stage. As if in response, his artistic practice allows him to bring into being the characters that were missing, something he initially achieved through drawing and later through 3D animation and ceramics. More complementary than supplementary, all of these mediums open innumerable doors via which this autodidact can explore the infiniteness of his own imagination and decode its mysteries, be it through pastels and coloured pencils or the aluminium plates he engraves to create astonishing ex-votos. While he acknowledges inspiration from some of the greats – Brancusi, Cocteau, Ernst –, Ranger doesn’t deny the influence of pop culture, from Barbie to Zelda and Pokémon. Recurrent in his works, non-gendered characters with heart-shaped heads are the guardians of a hybrid wonderland whose acid-coloured organic decor draws us in like children to a sweetshop, before losing us its delights."

Matthieu Jacquet - Numero Art Magazine 2021

(picture copyright Timothée Chambovet)

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