One could say that design is only one facet among the many facets of Amaury Poudray’s work, and indeed the artist no longer views it as an independent discipline but rather as a method, or as one of many ways of approaching things. Therefore, the forms he draws circulate effortlessly from art to design and from podcasting to landscaping, with each of these mediums naturally carrying the weight of these circulations. The overall result could easily be understood as the private chronicle of a personal story if it did not present itself as a conscious manifesto in which the artist asserts his refusal to partition states of being and making.

His reflection on the decompartmentalisation of forms and practices — artistic, spiritual, social — most often flourishes on account of a pooling of knowledges. The collective prevails: in 2022, he and Arnaud Mainardi created stargazing lookouts in the Cévennes, Pyrénées and Quercy national parks. This was a two-man project that involved movable pieces made of wood, stone and raw materials made to subtly blend into the landscape: a night-time invitation to familiarise oneself with cosmic realities that stretch far beyond the scope of our bodies, as well as a medium for introspection and reverie. Expanding on this contemplative proposal, they also set up a cartographic totem to help interpret the constellations, along with an agora, which allowed for collective stargazing: indeed, the question of transmission is at the heart of Amaury Poudray’s preoccupations, and as such he acts as a sculptor of connections, an investigator of relationships and a designer of shared processes.

Also in 2022, he conveyed another form of bodily experience with the creation of a series of installations in the Aubrac regional nature park and along the Camino de Santiago. Some of these constructions were conceived as passages to facilitate crossings, while others were meditation stations. Once again, integration and remaining true to local essences were requisites: using drystone and chestnut wood¹, Amaury Poudray blended the work subtly into its natural setting and confirmed its graphic asceticism — a distant heir to a minimalist movement situated between ethics and aesthetics. Less is more, as if emptiness in this case amplified the proposed psychospiritual journey, immersing the public in the definition of the craftsman’s gesture per se: bonding with the feeling that the craft requires, the craftsperson engages their body and experiences the limits of their materials, of the tools they use, of their weary hand, and of the finiteness of life… Through these limits, Amaury Poudray conveys a form of self-awareness, an experience that invokes affects and humanity with regard to materials and nature.

In these various forms of rest, the question of revitalisation intersects with that of resources. Once in awe of auteur design, Amaury Poudray no longer sees the point of producing even more pieces of furniture, unless its purpose is to embody a manifesto. A proponent of reuse since 2016, he created the piece Guildo² in 2023, inspired by a chair he thrifted on the Brittany coast and made out of recycled local materials: sipo mahogany from a solid wood drying depot and offcuts of polyester fabric from a printing company specialising in point-of-sale displays. He went even further with the design, printing a saying onto the seat fabric by Tibetan monk Chögyam Trungpa, who, through his diligent practice of meditation, encouraged humans to look at things as they are. The collapse of biodiversity and the reuse of waste materials such as the tarp and sipo, which were supposed to be discarded, are constituent elements in this real situation which it is urgent to duly acknowledge. Therefore, through his life experience, Amaury Poudray creates objects according to a system of frugality, in which ecology and cooperation reintroduce awareness into our customs.

Lastly, creation in educational contexts, from kindergarten to university, has increasingly taken up the artist’s attention. His recent invitations to curate a series of round tables on approaches to contemporary design and craftsmanship have led Amaury Poudray to develop new grounds for experimentation through these types of encounters and methods of research. The freedom he has with his thoughts and his taste for the immaterial have also prompted him to explore the world of podcasting: his upcoming Zigzag podcasts document great existential shifts, sidesteps, and unconventional experiences. Five episodes are currently in production, and will feature an energy healer, a professional chess player, a widowed father, and a near-death experience survivor — as many voices that open up new paths for the designer, both personally and professionally.

This deliberate intertwining of lived experiences has become the artist’s signature. For the longest time, art history chose to make a distinction in visual works between their significant aspect, which might be documented from textual, literary or historical sources, and their formal dimension, seen merely as an embellishment indifferent to any production of meaning. And yet it now seems that there exists no such clear-cut division, in the same way that there is no dualist separation of body and soul: everything works and produces meaning as one. Amaury Poudray’s work does not separate style and substance, hand and mind, art and life. His artistic journey demonstrates a “pedagogy of reality”, in which each situation provides an opportunity to learn and spirituality is a key notion and permanent consideration, rather than an answer.