Pains (Douleurs) (2025) Original Mixed-media Painting by Séverine Loisel

A sombre, powerful abstract dominated by an almost monochrome field of deep black, brushed with subtle variations of charcoal grey and the faintest warm undertones bleeding through from beneath. The background is smooth and atmospheric — a dark, undefined space, with a few pale, ghostly vertical drips on the left like traces of something that ran and dried.
Set against this void are four raised, encrusted forms — fragments of textured material (cloth, plaster-stiffened fabric, or built-up modelling paste) that protrude from the surface in heavy relief. Charred and crumpled, they look like burnt remnants, wounds, or scars — knotted clusters scattered across the canvas in a loose diagonal. Their rough, blistered texture catches the light and contrasts sharply with the flat darkness around them. The slim gold frame is a striking choice — it dignifies the bleakness, almost like a reliquary holding something precious and painful.
The title and its resonance
Douleurs — "Pains" / "Sorrows" — gives the abstraction its raw emotional core. The four encrusted forms read as wounds on a body, or burdens carried in darkness; the black field becomes grief itself, vast and enveloping. There's nothing literal here, yet the feeling is unmistakable — suffering made visible through material and texture rather than image. Restrained, dignified, and deeply moving.
Style
Matterist, material abstraction in the strongest sense — squarely in the lineage of Antoni Tàpies and Alberto Burri, where raw materials, relief, and rupture carry profound emotional and existential weight. The near-monochrome palette and physical assemblage make this an austere, contemplative work that speaks through matter alone.

Materials used:

acrylic, fabric, collage

Details:

• Mixed-media painting on Canvas
• One of a kind artwork
• Size: 2 x 2 x 2cm (framed)
• Framed and ready to hang
• Signed on the front
• Style: Abstract
• Subject: Abstract and non-figurative