My mother
“ In this photo (I’m in her arms), she is seven years younger than I am today. She already had five children, aged from 1 to 13. My father was an officer in the army, and after moving thirteen times in fifteen years to follow him abroad, she had finally settled into a large house in Bordeaux, which she managed without the slightest outside help. Suffice it to say that she was overwhelmed! She was a mother capable of taking the blame for our mischief to smooth things over with our more strict father. A woman nourished by culture: she always had a book within reach. And a curious mind, ahead of her time (late 1960s): with my father, she took courses in environmental sciences. My parents went out often in the evenings. And on weekends, the whole family climbed aboard a Volkswagen van to explore the most beautiful sites of the Landes, the Dordogne, and even the Pyrenees, camping in the wild. The beauty of the landscape mattered more than comfort.”

Me
“At 42, I have my two daughters, aged 15 and 20, at home. My 18-year-old son lives with his father. I have made sculpture my profession for about fifteen years. I create, I exhibit, I work with galleries. Sometimes I have only two days to set up an exhibition, and then I apply my motto: ‘You must always try.’ My works draw their inspiration from Africa, where I spent part of my childhood. I go out less often than my mother did, but like her, I take my daughters to exhibitions, such as those of Calder and Kandinsky at the Centre Georges-Pompidou, which thrilled them. In summer, I like to gather my friends and surprise them with my little dishes.”

Our similarities
“We were sent to boarding school out of geographical necessity. My mother at 10, me at 13, and it is far from being our best memory! Like her, I married young (she at 21, me at 20), and both of us had our first child at 22. Like her, I hate having things imposed on me. I saw my mother stand up to officers who wanted to make her blow into a breathalyzer: she felt it was unjustified, and they eventually gave in.”

Our differences
“My mother is an intellectual; I, on the other hand, have more of an artist’s nature and am more sensitive than she is to harmony. In my home, every object is the memory of a place, a journey, or a loved one. My mother is very curious about others and loves meeting them; I am more contemplative.”