Eric Saint Georges

Eric Saint Georges Description

Born in Paris, France, Eric Saint Georges moved to the US in 1994. “As far as I can remember,” says the artist, “I have always been drawing and building things, but it is a workshop with the sculptor Petrus in 1978, which triggered my passion for sculpture.” At that time, Saint Georges had just completed his education in electrical engineering. Rather than going right away to work, he applied to the “Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts” in Paris, and studied drawing and sculpture there for 2 years, before spending several months with Petrus, from whom he learned the foundation of his clay technique.

It wasn’t until 2015 that Saint Georges decided, after a 35-year engineering career, to take up art full-time. His drawings are composed of charcoal, ink, and watercolor and his sculpture water-based clay which he then casts in bronze. These mediums allow him to work quickly, his main interest being to capture life and energy in as spontaneous and raw a manner as possible. He works mostly from life, his preference being very short poses. 

Saint Georges lives and works in Santa Barbara and actively teaches figure drawing and sculpture workshops.

Eric Saint Georges Statement

I watch the model, I feel the tension of her movement in my own body. With my knife I make bold cuts in the block of clay, trying to capture the essence of the pose. I must work fast, to keep the energy flowing, and when I start to see life emerging from the clay, I feel alive too...

I draw a few lines, quickly, sometimes with a couple of watercolor strokes. I do not think, just keep my focus on the model, enjoy the freedom of my hand moving, and the contact of the charcoal on the paper. Then, once in a while,  the drawing is alive and I can feel the movement and the mood of the model, and I see that I have nothing to add to it and that if do, it is going to ruin it...

My sheet of paper on the table, I load my brush with black ink. I close my eyes, try to empty my mind of any pre-conceived idea of what I am going to paint, enjoy the calmness of the moment, and let the brush move, my eyes still closed. Later I can add a few acrylic splashes to balance the composition.

Many years of Aikido practice led me to understand (and experience) that relaxing, feeling the situation with my body without letting my control freak mind to take over, and trusting the process, results in the most appropriate (powerful/ beautiful) response. In a similar way, I believe that the most direct path between what I see/feel and what I create (whether it is a piece of artwork or martial art technique) with minimal interference from my mind, results in an authentic expression of my self, along with greater liveliness and energy. This is what I explore in my work, whether figurative or abstract.

In my figurative drawings I like to combine charcoal, ink, and watercolor, which allows me to work quickly, and capture life and energy in as spontaneous and raw a manner as possible. I draw almost exclusively from life, my preference being very short poses. I do not try to tell a story, as much as to capture the movement, the emotion.

In a similar fashion, (even though I also enjoy carving once a while a stone or a beautiful piece of wood), I create most of my sculptures in clay, which allows me to work fast. I can then cast them in bronze, which is time consuming but very rewarding.

I now spend my time between my studio in Santa Barbara (CA), the Santa Barbara City College studio lab and foundry, and various life drawing sessions in the area.

When hiking, I also love to build these temporary balancing structures, which sometimes turn out to be surprisingly beautiful...

One of my longer-term objectives is to use my engineering background to combine art and technology.