soCurio | art is for everyone

Being a devoted and prolific painter for the past 45 years i believe i have acquired the knowledge and the skills to express my ideas visually. i believe in me and i am persistent, love to learn, reclaim failures. Being passionate is an energy force that makes me want to paint intensely...................................................................... A bio written by Polly Duff To see Jean Becette’s work is to take an anthropological journey into the diverse cultures which contributed to his development as an artist. The refined structure and sophisticated simplicity betray the influence of Asian sensibilities. The mountains of a Sung Dynasty landscape emerge from mist; iconic images of hands, arms, or profiles evoke Japanese ghost stories. There is no denying the influence of American abstract-expressionism in the color and movement of the pieces; yet the work overall is uniquely Jean’s and very French. Jean was born in Lyon, the third largest city in France, in 1957. His father moved the family to post-colonial Cambodia two years later. For the next six years the Becettes were based there, and traveling throughout Southeast Asia and Japan. In 1965 the growing political instability and rise of the Khmer Rouge precipitated a return to Lyon. Lyon, capital of ancient Gaul, is rich in culture, architecture, and learning. It is a gourmet haven, and home to a university second only to the Sorbonne. Jean completed his secondary education here, and at age seventeen, embarked for the United States. Jean arrived in Orlando, Florida, in 1974 and attended Lyman High School as an AFS student. After attaining fluency in English, he began his formal artistic training at the North Carolina School of Art. Two years later, Jean transferred to the Atlanta College of the Arts for his Bachelor of Fine Arts. Throughout this period, Jean satisfied his passion for exploration by traveling throughout America. He paid his bills and fed his so very French love of fine cuisine by working as a chef. He was uniquely suited to the job at a time when French-Asian fusion-cuisine was being introduced to American palates. Jean moved to New Brunswick, New Jersey, in the 1980s for his Master of Fine Arts program at Mason Grosse School of the Arts. He has taught at the Arts Council of Princeton, Princeton Junior School, and since 1995 has been the driving force behind the Princeton Friends School’s highly-regarded art program. Jean’s work has always defied categorization. His iconoclastic inquisitive nature has led to the use of unusual media and surfaces. An early series, drawn and painted primarily on tar-paper, was part of a traveling exhibition in Western and Central Europe. His last group of shows at The Artists’ Space, works on paper and un stretched canvas, combined monotypes, other print-making techniques, drawing, and painting, often in the same work. The works are organized in series: Ghost Marks - which have a photonegative quality and explore Jungian archetypes; the images of our human origins Walker: hunting for clues in the depth of human experience – paintings and drawings which use the eye as metaphor for the human being as visionary Flow – primarily works on paper, with dynamic gestural lines, eroding shapes, and overlays of familiar landscape forms In Id, pas suivant – currently in progress, the works continue Jean’s exploration of semiotics – the meaning of sign and symbol in the human psyche while in transitions for changes.