celine chollet – our resident artist for 2018

We are super excited to introduce you to ‘our artist’ for 2018!   Celine Chollet is a talented French lady, whose work  we have been following fro a while.

Céline writes a blog about her lovely part of the world in Auxerre, a charming town, about two hours south and ever-so-slightly east of Paris, and also about her beautiful watercolour paintings, in particular those of houses and French architecture.

Her beautiful 16th century home lies hidden behind a secret gate in this pretty and ancient town…  her home is very photogenic!

Céline studied fine art, but even before that,  art was an obvious past time, because her mother was an illustrator , and encouraged all of her children to pick up a brush.

Céline worked as an illustrator for a while, then decided to combine her love of the French ‘patrimoine’ or national treasure, with her love of watercolours, and she started to paint portraits of houses.

The beauty of working as an illustrator and artist, is that you can work from home.  Céline combines her work with caring for her house and her family.

She and her husband Olivier both love to hunt for brocante and antique treasures, and their house is a wonderful lesson in curating and careful collecting of objects without ever becoming overwhelming.

Her kitchen for example, is tiled in old blue and white tiles that she bought over the years until she had enough to cover the wall.    The lovely coppers are all antiques that she bought piece by piece, and their divine kitchen island, is an antique counter or cupboard, that she and Olivier converted for use in their kitchen – stunning!

Céline has painted a lot of the furniture in their home, including the kitchen island and the kitchen cupboard, she even painted the piano!

Today Céline paints for her pleasure, and has a couple of books portraying the architecture of France, including one about the Aisne region which came out recently.

She is also available for painting house portraits on commission.  She works from photos, (as I can attest) or she can move around.  Frankly my photos do not do justice to the beauty and accuracy of her paintings, they are even more beautiful in real life.

If you would like to ask Céline about painting your house, then you can contact her HERE, and maybe include a photo of your house for her to see.  In the meantime we will be sharing her work in each box during 2018!

Céline’s blog