Céline Ducrot’s paintings are rendered in airbrush on MDF board. The airbrush is a small, handheld dispenser, that once triggered, causes paint to be atomized into a fine mist, which is then applied to a surface. This acrylic and compressed-air mixture achieves precision via the artist’s hand, as she physically distributes and controls the intensity, radius, and spray pattern onto the painting. The extension of this painterly technique was pioneered in the 1920s by Man Ray, the main representative of Dadaism, who experimented with the so-called Rayograph. Céline Ducrot’s paintings have a formal vocabulary characterized by her use of color, composition, and meticulous attention to detail. She uses a steady hand as well as precision tools to achieve her signature sharp, crisp lines and accurate shapes and forms. Color is also a major player in her work, with this series utilizing primarily yellow and blue hues. Blue, bleak landscapes and dark, shadowy tones are much of what we encounter in juxtaposition to the occasional enlightened or illuminated body. The warm orange and brown tones jump out of the pictorial plain in comparison to the subdued, complementary blue tones that blend into the backdrops and interiorscapes. The atmosphere constantly oscillates between familiar and sinister, artificial and organic, intimate and foreign, between tenderness and brutality. These contrasts are equally inherent in the pictures, without the turning point being resolved. The resulting tension is the central element of the works. The longer one looks at the figures, the more uncertain the status of what is depicted becomes.