Winter Park gallery selling one-of-a-kind pieces from artist featured in the Louvre

Art enthusiasts who step into Winter Park’s Uptripping gallery will find a variety of paintings, prints and furniture, but those enthusiasts with the sharpest eyes will notice that tucked in between a local photographer and a vintage record player are original pieces by one of the world’s most prolific artists.

Guillaume Azoulay is a self-taught artist from Morocco known for his line work, whose pieces have found homes on the walls of the most heavily trafficked museum in the world, the Louvre, as well as the personal collections of President Ronald Reagan and former French President Francois Mitterrand.

Azoulay’s unique drawings of animals and famous faces also fit Uptripping’s alpine rock-n-roll vibe perfectly, said Shannon Henn, owner of the gallery.

“We like being that funky, cool place to get off-the-beaten-path artwork,” Henn said. “And it’s crazy to know that he’s an artist who’s in the permanent collections of the Louvre.”

Currently on the walls of the gallery are three one-of-a-kind Azoulay pieces and one of his originals, including drawings of Keith Richards, Jimi Hendrix and one of a series of horses Azoulay drew with inspiration from the Kentucky Derby, as well as an original drawing of Jerry Garcia.

The gallery also has a print of Azoulay’s rainbow jaguar on sale.

Henn explained that each of the one-of-a-kind pieces for sale at Uptripping was hand touched by Azoulay, either hand embellished with gold leaf, like the Richards drawing, or hand colored, like the Hendrix piece. 

“All of our pieces are coming direct from him, so that’s how we’re getting our hands on these true one-of-a-kinds or originals,” Henn said. “We like to get his art into the hands of people in our community or people visiting our community.”

One way she ensures the art will get out into the community is to price it differently from other galleries or even the market rate. Henn said she works out a price with Azoulay for each of the pieces he sends and then doesn’t mark them up any further.

For example, the drawing of the horse available at Uptripping would cost the buyer $3,500, while a piece from the same series is being sold through an online gallery for $7,500.

“It’s fun for us to find new homes for artists and bring new stuff in so we like to keep the pricing reasonable,” she said. 

Henn said one of the best parts of having Azoulay’s art on her gallery’s walls is the conversations she gets to have with people about the pieces, whether they are familiar with his work or not.

“People who know him, really know him, … because like any artist they’re famous in their worlds and if you know that world then it’s like holy crap,” Henn laughed.

She herself became a member of the Azoulay fan club when she purchased the gallery’s first piece by him at auction. When it sold quickly, Henn reached out to the artist via social media and developed a relationship with Azoulay.

Uptripping now gets all of the Azoulay pieces they sell directly from the artist and frame them in-house using the services provided by Framewerx.

Since reaching out to Azoulay, Henn said two other pieces of his have sold from the gallery’s collection. 

“(People) are coming in specifically to see what new pieces we have by him, which is so cool,” Henn said. “Hopefully, we will always have different pieces from him in here.”

via:: Sky-Hi News