Artist’s Statement
My art is a reflection of my experiences and travels, shaped by my upbringing in France and the diverse cultures I encountered while living in Southeast Asia, West Africa, and the Middle East. Through abstraction, I seek to evoke both comfort and narrative.
I approach my monoprints much like a painter would a canvas—improvising with paint, collage, and hand-stitched fiber elements. I create monoprints, relief/engraving prints, print installations, and paintings that emphasize improvisation and layering.
Themes of identity, history, progress, and decay weave through my work, transforming these concepts into expressions of beauty. For example, in my “Burmese Days” series, my reflection was drawn to the women in remote parts of Burma and their deep connection to the textiles they create and wear, their dyeing processes, and the subtle alterations they make as their fabrics age.
In 2022, I began exploring larger works and installations, creating modular panels and narrow banners measuring 9 x 3 feet, while also developing more traditional formats for galleries and exhibitions.
Bridging various art forms, I draw inspiration from both relief print and monoprint techniques. In series as diverse as Burmese Days and Habitat & Urban Matter, I blend multiple elements, using paper in ways that lend themselves to installations and moving banners. My recent work, Les Bleus à l'Âme, delves into weaving by slicing monoprints into fine strips and interlacing them to form new compositions.
My use of color—expressed through varied halftones, shades, and densities—reflects the places I’ve lived. For example, my passion for deep blues and indigo was sparked by the textile traditions of Burmese tribes who have preserved this craft for generations. While Cote d’Ivoire and Senegal in West Africa, introduced me to an entirely different palette, one infused with the rich, earthen hues of laterite, which adorns the landscape in shades of terracotta and brown.
Agathe Bouton - 2025
Biography
Agathe Bouton is a French artist living and working in the Philadelphia area whose boundary-pushing printmaking and paper works exhibit influence from living and working in international cities across the globe. Bouton earned her BFA in Painting and Printmaking and her MFA in Arts and Textile Design from the prestigious ESSAA Duperré in Paris, France. Since leaving Paris 19 years ago, Bouton has lived and exhibited her work internationally in Paris (France), London (UK), Philadelphia & New York (USA), Rangoon (Burma/Myanmar), Dakar (Senegal) and Istanbul (Turkey). She has had solo exhibitions at the Biennale de l’Art Africain Contemporain in Dakar, Senegal; Rathaus House in Waldbrol, Germany; Centre d’Arts Plastiques Albert Chanot in Clamart and Galerie Martine Namy-Caulier in Paris, France; Galerie Od’A in Istanbul, Turkey; River Gallery in Yangon, Burma/Myanmar; the Bettie Morton Gallery in London, UK and Stanek Gallery in Philadelphia.
Bouton has received numerous awards in France and the United States for her accomplished printmaking including the Pierre Laurent First Prize in 2007 in Albi, being named a finalist in the Prix GRAV’X in 1999, and 2005 in Paris, France. In 2022 she received the Meyer Family Award for Contemporary Art, USA, and the Women United Art Movement in Printmaking. In 2023 she’s a finalist of the 98th Annual International Competitions of The Print Center in Philadelphia. Since moving to the U.S., she has exhibited extensively in Philadelphia and New York. Additionally, Bouton’s work is in the collections of French institutions including: the Bibliothèque Nationale, Cabinet des Estampes; L’Inventaire, Artothèque du Nord Pas de Calais; and the Musée Français de la carte à jouer; as well as American public collections, for example: the Print and Pictures Collection at the Free Library of Philadelphia and the Swarthmore College Library.