Karine Rougier paints scenes alive with vibrancy, where figures are swept up in a wind carrying the urgency of renewal. These fragments of form outline a world of desire, driven by an irresistible vital force. The artist’s gesture, marked by an assertive freedom, infuses her works with a magnetic energy, inviting us to contemplate a universe in which life is celebrated in all its forms.
Born in Malta in 1982, Karine Rougier currently lives and works in Marseille. She studied at the Decorative Arts School in Geneva, followed by the École Supérieure d’Art in Aix-en-Provence.
Moving between memory and direct observation of nature, Karine Rougier absorbs her surroundings to create works in which bodies and earthly matter merge and narrate themselves together. Her pictorial gesture—at times scratched, erased, or repeated—approaches the surface as a true journey, a space for meditation. Her paintings and drawings seem to drift along their contours like a motionless tide, capturing the gaze and inviting contemplation. Within these compositions, Karine Rougier weaves a singular harmony: bodies intertwine and blend with matter, revealing an unexpected strength and intensity, as though each work were animated by a hidden energy, both terrestrial and celestial.
Her work has been exhibited across Europe and internationally, with major milestones including representing Malta at the Venice Biennale in 2017 and receiving the Drawing Now Prize in 2022. In 2026, she will exhibit at the MAC in Marseille and at the MUCEM as part of the group exhibition Bonnes Mères, curated by Caroline Chenu and Anne-Cécile Mailfert. In 2027, a solo exhibition will be dedicated to her at the Maison Dora Maar.