The paintings of are constructed by a technique of removal, by strata, one might say. Brush strokes reveal motif. At times this motif is tangible, as in the Échiquier (Chessboard) or Corps singuliers (Singular Bodies) series, and in the poetically-titled abstract canvases of the Chants de nuit series, it is often enigmatic.
Modern abstraction interested him from the beginning, and through his blue work he was able to strip his painting of any narrative or decorative element. Working with natural pigments – blue, rosy beige, white, ochre –, he infuses these immense canvases with intense emotion.
Saâd Hassani paints silence, fleeting dreams, obsessions that dissipate and the passage of time. He paints the beauty of the world and its pain.
His most recent works are a continuation of those that came before. These paintings are more compact, and the vital gesture present in Chants de Nuit is foremost. The successive pictorial layers that have marked the artist’s work for many years give substance to a physical presence, offered up in its immediacy.
Here, paint is dominant, and the power of abstraction is taken to extreme, exalting the creative force of the artist.