Anthony J. Moreau

Anthony J. Moreau paints the human figure on the border between realism and abstraction. His figuration proceeds by additions and erasures, in an interplay of masses and lines that leaves the gesture visible: the aim is less to describe a model than to convey its physical presence and emotional charge. He claims a lineage with French painting, from the Belle Époque to Post-Impressionism and Modernism, while seeking a simplified form that keeps only the essential.

His artist statement describes "an intuitive painting, both objective in its representation of reality and subjective in the creative process", attached "to the moment, the unexpected and organic perception" (anthonymoreau.com). Strengthening the presence of the subject on the support is named there as the decisive axis of his research.

The work begins before the canvas: he gathers ideas, tones, textures, objects and visual fragments, from which he makes preparatory collages; these assemblages become the basis of oil paintings, most often on linen (presentation text by Galleri Ramfjord, Oslo). Drawing keeps an independent place — charcoal, graphite, sometimes marker on 270 g Strathmore paper — and some series continue from one work to the next, such as the "Post La Mettrie", numbered in Roman numerals.

Anthony J. Moreau was born in 1989 in France. A self-taught artist, he says he was drawn to the visual arts from childhood and first developed a drawing practice — observational, then narrative drawing — before devoting himself to painting from 2024. He works mainly in oil on linen, as well as charcoal and graphite on paper, in measured formats: the pieces held by the gallery range from 22 x 28 cm to 80 x 60 cm.

His public career is recent and swift. In 2025 he was recognised by three international figurative competitions: an honourable mention at ModPortrait in Zaragoza, finalist in the portrait category of the Almenara Art Prize in Córdoba, and finalist for the Emerging Artist Award of the Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize in Sydney. In 2026 he won first prize in the portrait category of the Art Ascend competition in New York.

The same year his work was shown in Europe and the United States: at the Reial Cercle Artístic in Barcelona and the Ateneo de Madrid, at Galleri Ramfjord in Oslo, at Arcadia Contemporary in New York, and at Galerie Calderone — in Dinard, in a two-person exhibition with the sculptor Jana Büttner, then in Saint-Tropez. Galerie Calderone represents him and currently holds seventeen of his works, paintings and drawings.