Exhibition Before the Ashes: Fantôme explores black and abstraction at La Lison Gallery

Black can sometimes tell us more than the image itself... With Avant les cendres, the artist Fantôme presents at the galerie La Lison an anthology of original works centered on black, line, texture, and abstraction, in a dialogue between the visual arts and tattooing, from April 9 to May 16, 2026. Based in Nancy, this multimedia artist builds a pared‑down universe, threaded with strokes, overlays, and a deliberately open approach to abstraction. The exhibition invites viewers to experience a body of work where black becomes material, light, and a space for projection. Vernissage on April 9 at 7:30 PM.

Designed as a prequel to the exhibition Cercles, in Nancy, Avant les cendres broadens several strands already at the core of Fantôme’s practice: drawing, matter, reliefs, but also this approach of turning black into a space of projection rather than a mere color. For Fantôme, this black catches the light, reveals subtle vibrations, carves out lines, and lets an accessible abstraction emerge—one that favors sensation over explanation. The viewer is not asked to decipher a precise message, but to step into an open mental space.

The presence of Fantôme at the galerie La Lison takes on real significance. Based in the La Bête Humaine salon, the gallery is explicitly aiming to bridge contemporary art with the tattoo universe. And it’s precisely in this crossroad that the artist operates, moving from canvas to wall—and onto skin. He sums it up himself, describing himself as "often on the line: a tattoo artist who produces visual arts, a visual artist who tattoos". For him, the line isn’t merely a graphic element: it also marks a boundary between what is shown and what is kept private, between the visible image and a more intimate side.

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The artist also explains that they want "to develop a universal language, without code, without a reading key, open to the imagination and to introspection, accessible to all". Avant les cendres seeks above all to forge a direct link with the visitor, without overdoing it. With its blacks, textures, and forms reduced to the essential, Fantôme offers a sober exhibition that leaves room for the gaze and for interpretation. Also a way to raise the question of what becomes of a work when it travels beyond its own exhibition space.

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