Playing with scale and perspective, Julie Jonquet-Caunes creates hyperreal renderings of everyday objects

If you look at a patch of light on a wall, or a crease in a shirt sleeve, you might not have much to say or think too deeply about them. For Julie Jonquet-Caunes, these details carry a fully fledged story and a whole creative world.

The Paris-based illustrator grew up in Toulouse before moving to the capital at 18 to study graphic design. What followed was five years at an auction house, designing catalogues, invitations and exhibition signage – a job that put her in front of the objects most people only see tucked away in glass cabinets.

"Being in daily contact with the artworks and collections greatly enriched my perspective and deepened my interest in objects, their materials and their forms," she says. She's been freelance since 2015, and has spent the years since developing a drawing practice that now sees her working with the likes of Chanel, Flexform and Villa Noailles.

Her reference points include hyperrealism and trompe-l’œil still lifes of the 17th and 18th centuries, Surrealism, and, threaded through it all, the objects around us that people often ignore. "I love the memories and emotions they can evoke," Julie explains. "They allow me to explore colour and texture, but also to create compositions and play with differences in scale and perspective. These combinations tell a story that is unique to each individual."

The drawings started as hyperrealistic renderings of her own photographs, featuring ordinary domestic scenes. From there, she began isolating single elements and depicting them more directly, more like portraits than backdrops. This language grew into Objets trouvés (Found Objects), a series that treats clothes pegs, buttons and envelopes with the same reverence as a Charlotte Perriand stool or a Jacques Adnet lamp – design icons and laundry-day essentials, side by side, equally worthy of the spotlight.

More recently, her process has shifted towards collage, in which Julie gathers images from gallery websites, curiosity shops and social media into one sprawling folder, then arranges and rearranges them digitally before a single pencil hits paper. "I construct these compositions so that the shapes and colours respond to and complement one another, and so that their functions converge," she says. "Taken out of their original context, the objects can become intimate and symbolic, almost transforming into characters."

Julie recently collaborated with the wallpaper brand Bien Fait for a project that involved scaling up dominoes and seashells into full patterns: "I find designing patterns fascinating," she says. "Being able to see these shells or dominoes on a massive scale in an interior is truly exciting!" There's also a still life for a restaurant in Aix-en-Provence, commissioned by curator Marie Veidig and inspired by Cézanne, drawn at a metre and a half tall – enormous by Julie's usual small-scale standards. "It took a long time but was really great fun to do!" And then there's La Veste, an early commission that let her loose on a range of clothes in a looser, almost naïve style. "I loved working with their colour palette and the freedom I had to create."

If there's a message in all this, Julie isn't reaching for one. The closest she comes is a comment from a friend, who said they "look like sweets" while looking over a table scattered with her drawings. This is the kind of line that's stuck with her. "I don't know what I'm trying to evoke," she admits, "other than perhaps a sense of nostalgia for a memory or a shared reference."

September brings a run of new projects, including her first foray into animated drawing, as well as two magazine illustration series currently in the works. And after years of working small, she's angling for bigger projects: "I'm also hoping to start creating larger-format drawings soon!"