François Poitout

Painter — Teacher — Author

Born in 1958, François Poitout graduated from the École Normale Supérieure, where he specialised in Design. He teaches Art History and Visual Communication, subjects he enriches through his own artistic practice.

Based in the Lille metropolitan area, he has built a body of work rooted in observing the world and conveying emotion. A lifelong, passionate painter, he combines traditional techniques and contemporary approaches in the service of a sensitive and committed expression.

A sailor concerned about environmental issues, he published his first illustrated book in 2024, both poetic and educational, devoted to the whale. It marked the start of a series of books about nature and the oceans. The next one, more militant, will be called Save the Ocean!

A tireless traveller, François Poitout records his discoveries through mail art, travel sketchbooks and, of course, painting. His world draws on the memory of places. It was during an exhibition at the former Tossée factory in Tourcoing that he revealed an essential side of his work: that of a painter of the industrial heritage of northern France.

“In the painter’s studio, between glass walls and patio, the light turns Mediterranean. Facing the workbench, Jean Moulin square. Children are playing. On the threshold between outside and inside, the painter is on the alert.”

Hervé Leroy, L’audace de la discrète, Light motiv

Approach

My painting feeds on reality and tends towards abstraction. Moving from sharp to blurred, from shadow to light, through fluid gestures and textured effects, I would like to move between reality and each viewer’s imagination, evoking space-time, passage, elevation and the mystery of life.

Industrial heritage

My main source of inspiration is our industrial heritage, including the Tossée wool-combing mill. Vast perspectives of shadow and light, textures worn by time, a fascination for places steeped in the stories of men and their working lives. A human silhouette appears, a symbol of the worker used, mistreated, laid off.

Architecture of the metropolis

During the European Heritage Days, I reveal the architecture of the Lille metropolis, Old Lille, its railway stations: a subject that inspires me, a true invitation to travel.

Travel sketchbooks

My many travel sketchbooks from Morocco, Egypt, Mayotte, Turkey and India, as well as from the Lille area, feed and illuminate my paintings. I make them on commission and from photographs, to leaf through or to unfold into a panorama.

Formats

From small formats on torn rustic canvas of about 5 × 10 cm, intimate and easy to give, to standard formats of about 122 × 70 cm, up to large formats of 244 × 122 cm that call for wide, sweeping gestures. I love very elongated formats: they create tension and a more lyrical expression.

Exhibitions

• 2026“Tribute to Salah”, La Condition Publique, Roubaix
• 2023Exhibition at La Tossée, Tourcoing
• 2020“Heritage and Travels”, Atelier Capifrance, Lille
• 2017“Travel Sketchbooks”, Terres d’Aventure, Lille
• 2017Industrial heritage of northern France, Galerie de la Croix Blanche, Bondues
• 2015“Between Earth and Sky”, French Guiana
• 2012–2019Open studios, Tourcoing
• 2013“Industry Week”, CETI, Tourcoing
• 2012Burgundy huts, Museum of Naive and Folk Art, Noyers-sur-Serein
• 2012Galerie Terres d’Aventure, Brussels
• 2011Galerie de la Cité des Voyageurs, Lille
• 2011Croisé-Laroche, Marcq-en-Barœul
• 2011Huts at the Botanical Garden, Tourcoing
• 2010Espace Édouard Pignon, Lille
• 2009“Du grain de folie à la folie du grain…”, Villeneuve-d’Ascq
• 2009Palais des métiers, Croix
• 2008“Morocco in Motion”, Paris
• 2008“From the Banks of the Nile to the Ochres of Morocco”, Lille
• 2007“Builders and Colours”, Hospice d’Havré, Tourcoing
• 2007Bottrop, Germany
• 2006“Views of Roubaix”, canvases and sketchbooks
• 2006“A Spring for La Tossée”, Roubaix