At the Japan Expo, the great gathering of Japanese pop culture, which takes place from July 14 to 17 at the Villepinte exhibition center (Seine-Saint-Denis), visitors will undoubtedly be taken to take a picture In front of two statues, life -size, by Luffy, the central character of One Piece, the best -selling manga in the world. If curiosity stings them, they may even ask their creator, Christophe Desnoelle, in what material they are made. “In zinc,” he will reply.
Zinc, yes, this bluish white malleable metal, usually used to make gutters or bar counters. Couvreur-Charpentier in Saint-Maxire (Deux-Sèvres), Christophe Desnoelle, 33, knows the material well to work it every day on the surrounding roofs. The Japan Expo, where he will hold a stand for the first time, will be the starting point, he hopes, of his big project: craftsman, becoming an artist.
The idea forged in his head in 2015 after an “order” of his wife, Amélie, to shape in zinc a copy of the helmet of Sauron, the title character of the Lord of the Rings, of Tolkien. Until then, Christophe Desnoelle had exercised himself to make roses or symmetrical patterns, as sometimes fun doing the roofers-zinc on their free time. After Sauron, will follow a 34 -faces football ball, a Japanese maple intended to decorate a tombstone and a replica of the Lower Tête Mask of the Limier, one of the protagonists of Game of Thrones. “I said to myself that there was a way to go further,” he said. “Before that, I always thought I was a more physical than artistic.”
His passion for manga will then catch up with him. Inveterate reader of One Piece – but also Dragon Ball, Naruto, Bleach, Tokyo Ghoul, Titans’ attack, etc. -, this father of three begins to make weapons, statues, masks, directly from his favorite series. In zinc, always. His tools are those he handles in his professional activity: folder, shears, hammer to garnish, welding iron – all the art being to assemble pieces of zinc sheets in order to obtain a harmonious curve.
The Downstream of the Master
After a first Luffy of 1.80 meters in “Snakeman” mode (name of a combat technique), Christophe Desnoelle recently attacked a Luffy version “Joy Boy” (the enigmatic double of the hero), Who asked him for three hundred hours of work – mainly at night: “I suffer from a hyperactivity disorder that can leave me awake for three days in a row. As much as this disorder is used for something.”
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