Monumental Plants Nourish and Flourish in Adele Renault’s Lush Paintings

All images © Adele Renault, shared with permission

Nature walks are Adele Renault’s main source of inspiration. Spending her time between Los Angeles and Brussels, the artist (previously) encounters varying landscapes that catalyze her practice. While the rugged urban terrain of southern California bolsters desert plants and palms, the Belgian countryside bears lush vegetation and thickets of trees. Renault likes to connect her subjects with the environments she thrives in, explaining, “the flora become a metaphor for the people, both native and nonnative, who inhabit a city, enrich its cultural assemblage, and share in a collective consciousness.”

Placing a magnifying glass over small details that are often overlooked, Renault depicts transient features such as the intricate texture of leafy specimens, the protruding prickles of flowering cacti, and the way the the sunlight hits dense tufts of grass in the forest. She’s passionate about plants and appreciative of these minutia. “It’s a very nourishing subject. You can live with plants, eat plants, talk to plants, learn from plants and paint plants all your life,” she shares. “And that way, I’m sure you’ll live a happy life.”

Nowadays, Renault spends more time in her studio, leaving the larger walls for the next generation of muralists. The artist has some exciting projects coming up with galleries in Los Angeles and Brussels, so follow her on Instagram and visit her website to keep tabs on those works.

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