Épi’s artistic career began in the early 2000s on the streets of Paris, where, as a student of French literature, he stencilled quotations from the literary canon onto the city’s walls. Rather than the critical acclaim he had anticipated, his efforts attracted widespread opprobrium and the unwelcome attention of the Gendarmerie Nationale.
Influenced by the French stencil movement of the 1960s, Épi subsequently returned to Britain, exchanging walls for canvas and developing his own peculiar artistic philosophy, grandiosely termed ‘Destructivism’.
At the heart of his practice lies a profound contempt for the pretension, narcissism and intellectual vacuity of the contemporary art establishment, coupled with a determination to subvert the very industry in which he remains inexplicably desperate to succeed.
Appropriating and reimagining familiar works by the likes of Warhol, Basquiat, Hirst, Klein, Wool, Condo and Ruscha, Épi engages in what he insists is a sophisticated conceptual dialogue with the contemporary art canon. His work employs visual familiarity as a form of intellectual trompe l’œil, luring viewers into recognising celebrated masterpieces before revealing a satirical subtext intended to expose the absurdities of the originals, their creators and the market that venerates them.
Épi’s work has reportedly found favour among prominent collectors. Rumours are that Larry Gagosian owns two pieces.
Épi now lives and works in New York.