Born in 1966 and raised near Orange Air Force Base in France, Manolo Chrétien has vivid childhood memories of gazing out his bedroom window in awe of the aircrafts soaring through the sky. As the son of Jean-Loup Chrétien, a test pilot and the first French astronaut, hangars filled with prototype jet planes were his playground. He developed his passion for aviation early on in his life, though this was not expressed publicly until later. “I was inspired by the powerful aesthetic imagery of the planes, the passion and risk involved, and the developing technology. I think there is a strong link between air and art. My father is an artist; his very first dream was to trace the skies with pure curves, creating instant drawings or paintings with a ‘bird pen.’ The purity of line and movement is as important in the air as it is in art.”