What is at the Centre of Your World? #5

By Piper Delilah / April 2025

A Conversation with Adam Coquillas

Adam Coquillas is a young artist born in Argenteuil in 2001. He grew up alongside his mother, who is of Guadeloupean origin, and who instilled in him a passion for various artistic mediums from an early age. His interest in traditional drawing naturally emerged, echoing the discreet and withdrawn child he was. This intimate practice marked the beginning of his artistic journey. Today, he favors the use of fine markers and acrylic paint. His universe evolves towards a dark fantasy aesthetic, where marked contrasts between shadow and light dominate.

(Note: Adam’s first language is French, he was kind enough to interview in English for me)

Piper: What is at the centre of your world?

Adam: The centre of my world, me first, and then trust and hope. Trust, hope and faith are three things you need to have. Trust yourself, your family, your surroundings, your love, your gut. Whatever you want to be true, your heart. If you never stop trusting, I think everything will be good. So that is the centre of my world.

Piper: So it is trust, not you?

Adam: Well I trust me.

Piper: Are you religious?

Adam: I was, I had a very religious grandfather, family. I think even if I am not anymore, I know religious symbols and the religious way. The cross, God, good pictures to have.

Piper: It equips you with morals I think.

Adam: Even the idea of paradise, when you die, the heavens, I think it’s a good picture to think of.

Piper: What do you think happens when you die?

Adam: I don’t know. Maybe you go into another human.

Piper: So you believe in reincarnation?

Adam: Yeh, come back, restart again. I think it’s making me sad because I don’t want to… I just love my life. To be happy in Paris, I love it here. I do not want to be someone else.

Piper: Do you think about death often?

Adam: Kind of.

Piper: Do you think about it everyday?

Adam: I had to think about it every day. I have had sad things, my cousin killed himself one year ago.

Piper: I’m sorry.

Adam: My ***** attempted suicide around one month ago. My friend ****, her boyfriend killed himself one month ago, she told me like two days ago. She is very depressed, she is empty. She is very sad and it has crushed my heart to see her like that. He was my friend too. The thing is, it is making me very sad because it is not something I see in a traumatic way, because the first time it happened to me, my cousin, I was devastated. Crying a lot, and I don’t know if I still realise it? Since my cousin I have been dealing with death all the time, I think about it every day. I don’t think they would want me to be sad about it.

Piper: It is hard to hear that you faced this experience three times in one year.

Adam: It is devastating. The more I think about it.. woah. I just sometimes am alone and am depressed, it’s so hard to not… but I think my cousin would want me to be… it’s my cousin, I love him… I think he would want me to be happy and do my job, my things. So I take life more easy now.

Piper: Henry Miller says ‘Anyone who takes life seriously is doomed.’ I think about it most days. I have it written on my wall in my studio, when I am thinking too much or being dramatic, I remind myself, it’s not that serious.

Adam: No one knows why we are here, no one rules you, no one can tell you for no one knows. No one knows anything.

Piper: I attribute it to money often, I have been thinking about it recently and how I am going to figure it all out. But then I remind myself, think about the next month, stop thinking about five year’s time.

Adam: You have made it twenty-five years in your life without worrying too much, in five years you will be fine too, and the twenty-five after.

Piper: I also believe, do what you love and the money will come. What you said about faith and trust in yourself, I am trying to prioritise that, forget what anyone else thinks about me.

Adam: Trust in yourself, you are going to make it. I am not stressed about it, no one can show you the way.

Piper: I know your artistic practice, this is not my field of expertise, but for interview sake, in a world where you could draw and paint from a plethora of inspirations, why create and convey the images you do?

Adam: I say again to do with religion, God, the cross, about death too. I like to draw skeletons. I like to draw androgenous people, since I was a kid I didn’t appreciate people telling me whether somebody was a boy or a girl, so I got rid of it. People are androgenous, nobody knows, me neither, I don’t care. I like this. About video games too, fantasy world. Gothic style, dark. I cannot really explain it without my drawings. I think it is better to draw dark things because you can see the light, with my dark drawings with a big star. You cannot draw the hope if there is already too much light? If I draw a forest with sunshine, the hope is everywhere. If I draw dark things, the light is emphasised in comparison.

Piper: When you draw the ideal, or something that is objectively beautiful comparison is lost. Darkness offers the paradox, paradox exaggerates its parts.

Adam: It makes sense I draw in black and white.

Piper: If every time you walked into a song played, what would it be?

Adam: I would pick multiple.

Piper: But just one?

Adam: That is too hard.

(we later decided on Black Milk by Massive Attack)

Piper: When I saw you last you were drawing on a big scale, are you still drawing on the same size or have you scaled it down?

Adam: No I am not (scaling it down), because I want to impress. Actually, no one cares about painting and art…

Piper: You think?

Adam: No one in general… we both love art, so when I tell you that it looks crazy. But actually, no one cares.

Piper: You genuinely think no one cares?

Adam: Yes, so I think I want people to have a look at what I am doing and be interested, because if I am not doing that, nobody cares. I have done these exhibitions, people going by and just like ‘oh, you did that.’ They are not educated for it, for art is elitist, it’s too ‘how art is for rich people.’ No one has the education to be interested in painting and in drawing.

Piper: I think the irony of it all is, and I have been having this discussion with people recently, when you say art is for wealthy people… there is two sides of it, art is for wealthy people, however the people creating are either struggling by or they are extremely privileged and have the financial capacity to create all the time without having to worry about money. There is nothing wrong with that, there are just polar opposites. Maybe I am stereotyping.

Adam: I agree, I have to have a job just to afford my studio and I am struggling.

Piper: How do you feel about fame?

Adam: Fifty, fifty, because I want to become a star, but in the other way. I don’t know if I want to be like… I don’t think I will be able to face it. I want to shine, I want to be an artist that every knows. But no human is designed to be a star. It’s not human. You walk down the street, you are a human, and everyone considers you a superhuman. Millions of people adoring you and they don’t know you… they don’t know you… it’s crazy.

Piper: I go through periods, earlier we were talking about being actors and actresses, sometimes I think, yeh… maybe I would be good in the limelight, other times I think, I do not want anyone to know who I am. It is either one or the other, I am never in-between.

Adam: It is good to only be a star in your country, that’s all. You can go to other countries and no one knows who you are. I think, even if I really want to be famous as an artist, again no one is going to know me, everyone will know the work. Ask people to tell you ten painters, they aren’t going to tell you. Maybe two will tell you, but will maybe struggle.

Piper: I am more on the niche stuff at the moment, I am trying to put out this paper, share people’s work. I get conflicted with, maybe no one is reading it, or maybe I am not getting any traction online. But when I go into the stores where I put them, people come up to me and say ‘Oh you’re the girl! I love it!’. I have realised just because you don’t see it, does not mean people aren’t appreciating it. It is not instant gratification.

Adam: Be niche.

Piper: When you say, no one cares about art, I feel this with literature. People care, but they care more that you are doing something.

Adam: They do not care about the process, they care about what it is now, when it’s done.

 Piper: If you were given a box of everything you had ever lost, what would you look for first? It can be tangible, intangible.

Adam: I want to get back my sweater. My lovely sweater, I lost it I really loved it. I was mad about it. It was called (Piper: a brand I could not translate or find the precise spelling) it was from an employee from my work, gifted to me on my birthday.

Piper: Do you know where you lost it?

Adam: No, I don’t know how!

Piper: I think it’s coming back…I haven’t lost anything in three years. Things are simply misplaced, they arrive, they appear. I never look for things.

Adam: My sweater is not coming back…

Piper: You have to feel as though you are tethered to it and are pulling it back to you slowly.

Adam: If I find it I will text you. I was with a girl when I lost the sweater and I asked like two years ago ‘Do you have it?’ and she was like ‘No, what the fuck?’ The last time I had it was with her.

Piper: Maybe she has got it… maybe she loved it.

Adam: No (laughs) we are not in a bad way.

Piper: When people meet you for the first time, what is something you hope people notice about you?

Adam: My lip piercing… I am just joking.

Piper: It is noticeable though.

Adam: You notice it?

Piper: Yeh! What else do you hope they notice?

Adam: I don’t know actually, I really don’t. What about you? Your hair?

Piper: My hair!

Adam: Your perfume?

Piper: Yeh, maybe my new perfume, that would be cool.

Adam: I noticed it.

Piper: A girl I had dinner with this evening noticed it also, she didn’t realise I was the one wearing it. When people first meet me, I hope they notice that I am actually quite nice. I think, sometimes, I can come across as quite intimidating. Some people wouldn’t agree with that. I smile alot, I hope people notice that. Smiles are infectious. I smile they smile. I try very hard to be kind, even when others aren’t.  I am not being humble now. My next question, how do you find being an artist in Paris?

Adam: Not special, because everyone is an artist in Paris I think.

Piper: That’s like London though.

Adam: There are a lot of fake people though, I hate the word artist. I think when it is really in your heart, you don’t need to say it, you can just recognise it you know? It has been a while since I have said I am an artist, people know. I know when other people are.

(background noise of the waiter clicking the tops of our glass iced tea bottles)

Piper: Do feel that people know you are an artist when they meet you?

Adam: Yeh. I think it’s obvious.

Piper: I think so too.

Adam: What I wear, how I dress, how I speak. People tell me I walk like I am an artist. It is cliché, always a little lost but busy, thinking about other things.

Piper: I feel as though I can pick up very easily as to whether someone is creative or not, they seem to be slightly solemn, they are in their brain too much. People always seem to know I am a writer, especially when I wear certain glasses.

Adam: My shy me would be proud to look like an artist.

Piper: There is a fine line when you decide to start calling yourself an artist. There is a moment that comes, if feels quite forced to begin with, when you say, okay, I am an artist… when was that moment for you?

Adam: It began when I was five, I wanted to draw for my life. That’s all. I was saying to my mum, ‘I want to draw.’ She was saying it is hard to make money, I always asked why, it is what I want to do.

Piper: That’s optimism, it’s good. What is the ultimate goal?

Adam: If I could make a living with it, I can afford to live with my wife, live in the countryside, travel with my children, touch flowers, see the sea. I want to make my children happy.

Piper: It is freedom.

Adam: When I speak about it, I see flowers and my children running.

Piper: I think if you can see something in your brain, it is true in some timeline.

Adam: I want to live happy life.