Digital creator, Camille Soulat, tells stories through her practice as an artist. Her fascination for working digitally from a young age aided the development of her creative practice, Camille now works as an established digi artist in France. This year marked the debut of Camille’s first solo exhibition ‘Shower Lie’, a series of digital paintings shown at the Sissi club in Marseille. Currently, Soulat has an art residency in Leipzig, Germany as well as an upcoming group show project named DATA-BAT in Alençon, France at the Les Bains-Douches gallery. We recently chatted with the French artist about her work, influences and upcoming projects working with musicians.

What started your journey as a digital creator?

I have always been very comfortable in the digital world, when I was little I had fun by drawing scenes via the software Paint on the Windows 98 family computer. I told my stories while using the tools, for example I drew some brick walls in which I made tags using the spray paint tool, and then I would toy them with another name like if it was a gang territory fight. I would then erase them all with the eraser tool as a cleaning staff and if I was in a destructive mood I would blow everything out with the bomb tool. I had several stories that I was reenacting by drawing while talking in my head (plastic surgery clinic, hairdresser, magician…). Later I tried painting in the more classical way with acrylic paint but I was quite frustrated materially, working in my tiny flat with not many facilities. Painting digitally on a screen is a really comfortable zone for me, somewhere I can relax.

You say you ‘try to fix memories before they evaporate’ - can you explain this concept in more detail?

All my work is very nostalgic, and most of the time it translates incarnate things/feelings that I experienced. I have always been fascinated by memories, how we transform them and select them to tell our own stories. I am currently working on a video piece that really focuses on this topic in a more direct way.

What are your biggest influences that inspire your work?

In general I love to walk and look closely at my surroundings and I feel that it’s in this kind of moment that I get the most of my inspirations, I am also taking a lot of photos and videos during these walks. I have a big interest for internet culture, therefore I dig the internet a lot, looking for interesting music, jokes, images or words that I connect with. I can spend hours watching people’s TikToks, what I like with this platform and what inspires me a lot is that people share their stories in a very unapologetic and cathartic way. I love to find videos that express an empowering disaster mood, where people transform and reappropriate their own situation/story and share it to the world in a funny way. It would be very hard not to make a huge list of things that inspire me.

How would you best describe your aesthetic?

I feel like my aesthetic is a bit melancholic and contemplative, I try to add magic and fantasy in mundane things. I like to work on blurry and misty textures and try to focus on sensations.

From a technical perspective how do you create work?

I mainly work on Photoshop, and I draw with the pad for my MacBook pro. My setup is actually something that I really want to improve in the days to come because my right hand is suffering a lot from it.

Tell us about your recent solo exhibition, ‘Shower Lie’?

Shower lie was my first exhibition project, it was a great experience made possible by the Sissi Club (@sissi.club). I have shown several series of digital paintings printed on different mediums and in different formats. It was the opportunity to materialise my work for the first time and I tried to tell a story in a more shaped way.

What projects do you have upcoming we should look out for?

I am currently doing an art residency in Leipzig, Germany and I am working on a new exhibition project that I am still not a 100% sure will take place due to the COVID restrictions there. I will also participate in a group show project called DATA-BAT at Les Bains-Douches gallery (@lesbainsdouchesalencon) in Alençon, France.

At the same time, I also work with a lot of musicians on their artworks, it's something that I really like to do. I recently collaborated on all the visuals for Caro’s (@ultra_caro) first album that will be released on pcmusic (@pcmus), and I am really excited about it because I connect a lot with her work and with pcmusic in general.