Artistic approach

Laurine embroiders directly onto the clothes she sews.
Stitch by stitch, bead by bead, embroidery becomes a gesture of reappropriation of the body and symbolic repair. Clothing is not just ornamentation: it is a place where identity is negotiated, revealed, and perceived. It indicates social, cultural, religious, or gender affiliations, while sometimes assigning hierarchical or discriminatory functions, whether endured or claimed. Textiles thus impose themselves as an additional layer of reality, palpable yet covered by the invisible within us. This layer becomes a projection screen for new images, whether painted, woven, or embroidered.
Textiles, and more specifically costumes, act as an interface between oneself and the world: they give a role, a voice, a function. They allow us to temporarily become the person we choose to embody.Her research focuses on processional second skins: textiles worn or installed, which embody intimate and collective narratives. She considers costume as a ritual device capable of creating social bonds and producing a plural reality. Embroidery contributes to the construction of these symbolic communities, making memories, anger, and hidden stories visible where words fail. Within all these repressed narratives, Laurine weaves a connection: pagan myths erased by Christianity, embroidery discredited by patriarchy, and the demands of marginalized societies crushed and violated by capitalism. She wants to contribute to the emergence of contemporary rituals where textiles become a shared language, capable of transforming vulnerability into collective strength.

“I imagine loud, colorful, oversized textiles rebelling, occupying public space like a symbolic herd, drawing on the folklore of a deconstructed temporality, a return from the past to the present, a temporality conceived not as linearity but as a series of nodes.”

Artist’s biography

After attending high school specializing in applied arts, Laurine took her first course in animation drawing at the DMA in Roubaix, which later led her to enroll at EMCA in Angoulême. It was only after school that she returned to embroidery. She sketches and paints to find a form of expression, and the figures become imbued with her emotions and come to life under the embroidery threads. In 2025, she further developed her skills with training in Lunéville crochet with Soline du Puy and obtained her CAP Broderie d’Art (vocational training certificate in embroidery art). She perfected her jewelry and textiles, establishing both as an additional layer of reality, palpable yet covered by the invisible within us.

A look back at his experience

“I think the Maison Flottante has brought a chapter of my life to a close. I’ve closed one diary there and opened another – quite literally. It’s given me some perspective – rocked and buffeted by the turbulence – to move forward with my project on this not-so-static barge. I already miss my diary from last year. A distillation of a life-changing experience, unravelled through threads that had become tangled once more in a time that was itself muddled. Anger continued to rumble outside; police brutality, the revolt sweeping through the almost-grown-up children, the floodwaters receding after the fires, and the politicians who keep spewing their venom. The news fuelled my thoughts and channelled my sense of powerlessness into creativity. I dreamt of crowds in the streets, of a joyful, singing and poetic struggle. A shared hope for a better future. Amidst this divide of urgency and turmoil, the voices championing alternative visions are more important than ever. They promote alternative lifestyles and offer credible hopes.

I have based my project on the interplay between the individual and the collective. Working with our surroundings, so that trees and birds become our confidants, embodying our sorrows so that we may bear them better ourselves. I want to be part of a joyful, colourful commotion, where the intimate becomes turbulent, where the crowd becomes a loving relationship, where the ash tree, the magpie and the lily of the valley embrace our stories. Let us adorn the rebellion, embroider the turning point, and embellish the memories of those we forget, those we make others forget. We are here; we take our place and we create new skins, crocheted from our confidences. These are all the threads of thought that I have tried to embroider, with a clear head but fingers ablaze. Let us face the darkness together so that we are not devoured by it.”

Rencontre

19 September 2026
Maison Flottante - 52 Chemin du Halage, Poses
OPEN DAY : 19 September, 2 pm to 7 pm

To mark the artist’s residency, Laurine Kotte is opening the doors to the Maison Flottante, a structure designed by the Bouroullec brothers in 2006.

Partners

The residency is supported and assisted by:
the City of Poses,
the Seine-Eure Urban Community
and the Department of Eure.