I first discovered Hadrien Jacquelet’s work in Los Angeles, probably in 2012, at the very first show organized by our dear friend Jay in his apartment - a space that would, over the years, transform from a domestic home into one of the most vital non-profit art projects in the City of Angels. I like to think that the one wall project in Paris where Hadrien’s works would later hang is a silent extension, a tribute to Jay’s kindness, his visionary approach, and to our friendship.

When I arrived in Paris around 2020, Hadrien was the first artist I thought of for a project in our apartment. Soon he filled the space with what became the largest exhibition we had ever hosted: ten to twelve paintings, small and large, spilling even onto the second floor. Superheroes everywhere, dark portraits moving in strange, fluid gestures, the strong scent of fresh oil paint and pastel lingering, later softened by tobacco, and, of course, his Michael Jackson painting - uncanny, intimate, impossible. Many people stopped by, friends & family. A tribute, a mask, a mirror - all at once.

Hadrien’s work is about mastery, and then about recognition and distortion. Faces and figures hover at the edge of familiarity, sometimes human, sometimes slightly synthetic, almost ghostly. There is so much more he has explored: elegant portraits of singular, strange figures, one I have long wanted in my bedroom, hopefully soon. He is a poet; he paints poets. A wall, a room, a friendship, a city, two cities, entire universes, imploding and exploding.

Text by Patrick Steffen