François Burland was born in Losanna from Swiss father and French mother. Since he was a kid he would spend his Sunday afternoons painting at his grandmother’s house in Switzerland. During his holydays vacation he used to visit his mother’s parents in France. His grandparents house was full of trinkets from all over the world because such diverse was the house environment. Here Burland met with Arabs, Algerians, Jews fled from Algeria after independence as well as with war veterans from Indochina and gipsies. Burland taught himself to paint and refused academic training. His art is inspired by the rites and mysticism of warrior and nomad civilizations as the Tuareg from the Sahara desert and is instinctive and spontaneous as the contemporary versions of archaic expressivity. Similarly to many artists from his generation Burland is fascinated by mythology and legends as well as from the ancient sources used in modern literature and anthropology. Many references can be found in Burland’s art to Homer’s Odyssey and Iliad, to the myth of Perseus and to the celtic mythology, to the Indian and aboriginal cultures.
Burland’s work is featured in many public and private collections as the Collection de l’Art Brut in Losanna, the Du Mont Kunsthalle in Colonia, the LACMA in Los Angeles.