Rebecca Rebouché - Content
Rebecca Rebouché
ART FORM
PAINTER, MIXED MEDIA
LOCATION
NEW ORLEANS, USA
IN HER WORDS
"My specialty lies in storytelling and capturing the dichotomy of emotions and experience. I'm often influenced by dreams, surrealism and the natural world. The result is part magical realism and part naturalism."
Artist Rebecca Rebouché’s dreamscape, allegorical art
has graced everything from ceramics and duvets at Anthropologie to Roger la Borde paper goods. Based in New Orleans, which she describes as feeling “Caribbean and European at the same time,” Rebouché splits her time between an apartment and atelier in the city and a rural treehouse just outside of the hustle and bustle. Magical, no?
A painter by trade, she creates on canvas and paper, in oil, acrylic, watercolor, and mixed media. Known for her other-worldly style, she explains it beautifully saying, “My specialty lies in storytelling and capturing the dichotomy of emotions and experience. I’m often influenced by dreams, surrealism and the natural world. The result is part magical realism and part naturalism.”
Having worked with Collab Society’s co-founder Jennifer Rome for nearly a decade at Anthropologie, Rebouché sings her praises. “Jennifer was my main contact for the many projects we did over the years, from dinnerware to curtains, coloring books, rugs, wallpaper, and more,” and describes Rome as “steadfast, capable, and kind.” With Collab Society, Rebouché shares that she’s “looking forward to seeing the work of other artists and designers highlighted and brought to life in new forms and mediums,” as well as “seeing the diversity of expression that can be achieved when talented people are put together to achieve something new.”
Rebouché’s inspiration is fueled through many sources. She finds great joy in her New Orleans hometown and shares a gorgeous literary snapshot of her life there, sharing that “being a New Orleanian means you love your neighbor, you hear music in the streets, you take food seriously and you revel in the opportunity to celebrate life, whether in costume at Mardi Gras or dancing at funerals.”
Reminiscing, she says, “My favorite New Orleans experience is the spontaneous one you can’t plan, it arrives when you least expect it, a sudden summer rainstorm while crossing town on bicycle, a last minute invite to a fancy dinner, an art or music show, or one of those picnics in the park when the weather is perfection and it seems life could not get sweeter. All my favorite days have happened by being swept into the mysterious flow of New Orleans when you surrender to her magic.”
Rebouché also gains deep inspiration from her subconscious and emotions, explaining that “[for creative inspiration] I go into my dreams, into my inner-world, and into stories. I keep a sharp eye on my emotions and those of others and maintain a sort of library of symbols that I use in composition to express themes, myths, archetypes. But for research for that library I always go into nature. I enjoy painting birds from life, and painting landscapes en plein air, especially beach scenes.”
While some may attribute Rebouché’s calm presence and seemingly magical existence to luck or personality, it’s actually six famous words that have brought her there. “I like to remember Picasso’s famous words: ‘Everything you can imagine is real.’” It took me a long time to feel like I truly understood these words,” she admits “[but] now I believe them wholeheartedly. To me it is about invention and faith in the power of your ideas to transform your life.”