Look closely at Celine Masson’s art and you will notice her portraits are painted over a canvas of comic book images
By Angus Hamilton
I wasn’t familiar with ‘manga books’ until I met French artist Céline Masson for a coffee at the Junkyard Theatre recently.
Manga art originates from Japan, and it is used o illustrate novels and short stories, featuring anime subjects with exaggerated facial expressions. The art is typically black on white comic book style, and in Japan you would read them from right to left and top to bottom.
More on how Céline came to incorporate comic books into her creative process later. But first I want to share her journey, from growing up in Paris to a career in the hotel business, which brought her to Phuket in 1994; she’s about to celebrate 30 years on the island, so something has worked out well for her here!
After a year or two working for hotels in Switzerland, she had met her husband-to-be and by the mid nineties they both got itchy feet and were keen to develop their careers overseas. By this time Céline was particularly interested in the public relations side of management, and she noticed a PR job was available in far off Thailand, at the beachfront Phuket Cabana Resort in Patong. Not thinking for one moment that her application would be successful she was pinching herself when the GM at the Cabana said ‘oui’ and she was on a Thai Airways jet heading for Bangkok.
Her assignment at the Phuket Cabana Resort (now the Impiana Phuket ) proved to be life changing in the sense that she became mentored by her General Manager, one of the legends of Thai hospitality, Khun Wallee Pachantaburt. Khun Wallee realised it was a bit of a culture shock for this young timid French girl, who was like a fish out of water at first, but he took time to help her to adjust to Thai culture, and after a couple of years she was promoted to Front Office Manager.
Throughout her early career she particularly enjoyed the creative side of the job. She hadn’t yet picked up a paint brush, but she was always the first to volunteer to create an advertising board for a food promotion, or a newsletter for arriving guests. Early creative signs of things to come!
As the millennium came and went, and surviving the shock horror of the 2004 Asia Tsunami, Céline was too attached to the island to move on. By now she was married and when the two children had arrived they realised that Phuket is almost impossible to beat when it comes to a place to raise a family. Job offers came and went for both of them, but the grass never seemed greener anywhere else, so they stayed put.
In the ‘noughties’ she was a full time mum of course, and had time to develop a social life outside the hotel business. Céline and her husband met and became good friends with Khun Pisit, a talented architect, and on a day out in Phuket Old Town, which wasn’t as pristine as it is these days, they noticed a crumbling old Sino-Portuguese building, full of character and crying out for attention.
They couldn’t resist, so they bought it! Eventually, after a years’ renovation the 100 year old structure was re-born in 2006 as the Siam Indigo Exotique Boutique and Restaurant .
This is when the inner artist in Céline really started to emerge. The first floor of the building was turned into a collaborative creative space where Thai designers could retail their ornaments and jewellery, which included frequent exhibitions from local Thai painters. Céline was taking this all in, and seeds started to grow, although she didn’t know it at the time.
They operated Siam Indigo for 9 years, offering fusion style asian food, cocktails, art and corporate events. In 2016 it was sold, and now the building is home to the famous Tukapkhao Restaurant.
It was quite a fortuitous sale as it turned out. In late 2016 Thailand was in shock, and uncertainty, following the death of revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej, and in 2017 Phuket and southern Thailand experienced severe, once in a generation, flooding. Worse was to come of course as there were signs of a nasty pandemic brewing in Wuhan China, and the whole world was turned upside down in 2020 as COVID paralysed everyone’s lives.
Stuck at home, and with time on her hands Céline didn’t have to think too hard about what to do to occupy the hours, some form of art would be involved. She began to experiment, painting onto blank canvas wasn’t interesting enough, she was looking for other dimensions to her art. One of the kids was reading a manga comic, and an idea took hold, painting portraits with a comic strip in the background.
She only uses vintage Japanese comic books, some over 30 years old, “some pages have yellowed a bit, but the paper quality is fantastic so I can work with it” Céline points out.
“It’s hard to pinpoint my style, as I am still experimenting” she told me. “I start by glueing the pages from a vintage manga book onto a large canvas. I then apply a translucent coat of powder paint, which provides some grip for the acrylic to follow, without obscuring the cartoons; the whole idea is to see a comic dialogue within a woman’s face”
It’s as if you can see what is going on inside the woman’s head, as if she is thinking about what is in the comic storyline. In some cases the storyline is a bit naughty and sexy, which brings a subtle sauciness to her art. “Each work tells its own story, this way every one of my paintings is unique; no matter how many people try to copy them!!” she says.
With her girls now living overseas, Céline has more time to devote to her art. In June she held her first exhibition in Paris, and back on Phuket she has an event at the Pullman Arcadia Naithon coming up in December. If you are around, don’t miss this one as she will be collaborating with the amazing John Underwood, Touchable Art Design from Bangkok, and talented photographer Alaya Galla (pictured to the left).
If you would like to own one of Céline’s (pictured to the left) portraits, email her at the link below. Get in now before her popularity (and prices) skyrocket, which undoubtedly will happen. For my part, I am looking forward to the self portrait, with a manga comic strip of her life in Phuket in the background!
