Astrée Lhermitte-Soka is a French artist born in Paris in 1974, daughter of actor Thierry Lhermitte and Hélène Aubert. Trained in graphic design and illustration at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia, she worked as a graphic designer in New York before returning to France to focus on painting, and later on more experimental forms of visual art.
Video and moving image: a territory overlooked by biographies
Articles about Astrée Lhermitte-Soka almost systematically present her as a painter, sometimes as a former film makeup artist. This description is incomplete.
In recent years, she has developed a practice of video and moving image showcased in small contemporary art venues. These works take the form of projected installations and very short films that blend text, voiceover, and scanned painting.
This shift towards animated imagery logically extends her training as a graphic designer and her time on film sets. The boundary between visual arts and experimental cinema for her is not a marketing gimmick: it is the continuation of a journey that has always oscillated between fixed visuals and narrative imagery.
A more detailed portrait of Astrée Lhermitte-Soka allows for an assessment of the breadth of this artistic trajectory, far beyond just the status of being the daughter of a famous actor.
Artistic journey of Astrée Lhermitte-Soka: from American graphic design to conceptual painting
Understanding her current work requires retracing the steps that have shaped her. After her studies at the Savannah College of Art and Design, Astrée lived for about three years in New York, where she worked as a graphic designer. This immersion in the American scene gave her a visual culture distinct from that of the Parisian milieu.
Upon returning to France, she initially shifted towards film makeup, a technical profession that demands a keen understanding of light, textures, and framing. Then painting became her main practice. Among her well-known works are series with evocative titles: Doux-sœur, Les robes porte-bonheur, Hexagone exigu.
What has changed more recently is the very nature of her pictorial work. Gallery presentations describe a marked evolution towards more conceptual series since the pandemic:
- Use of family archives integrated into the canvases or installations, creating a dialogue between private memory and public image
- Incorporation of fragments of scripts and storyboards, a direct legacy of her proximity to the film world
- Work on the memory of images and the role of the viewer, which brings her recent pieces closer to contemporary conceptual art rather than classical figurative painting
This shift is not trivial. It transforms an artist whom the tabloid press readily classifies as “star child turned artist” into a visual artist whose approach is part of current debates in contemporary art regarding the status of the image.
Independent galleries and group exhibitions: a regular and discreet presence
Online content focuses on her lineage with Thierry Lhermitte and skims over Astrée’s career in a few lines. The result: there is almost no mention of her participations in recent group exhibitions.
However, she is a regular participant in local programming: young artist fairs, associative galleries, off events from major fairs. These spaces, often distanced from Parisian media circuits, form the real fabric of the contemporary French art scene.
This discretion aligns with the choice she made from the outset. Astrée has never sought to capitalize on the Lhermitte name to accelerate her visibility. Her personal website, hosted on a minimalist platform, highlights her works without an elaborate biographical staging.
Lineage and autonomy: what the Lhermitte name means in the artistic community
Thierry Lhermitte is one of the most recognized French actors by the general public, particularly due to his years with the Splendid troupe. His private life, however, remains little exposed. He has three children with Hélène Aubert: Astrée, Victor, and Louise (known as Lonny).
Astrée’s case illustrates a common dynamic among the children of showbiz personalities: the choice of an adjacent but distinct artistic field. She did not attempt to become an actress. Her experience in film makeup served as a bridge, not a destination.
The Lhermitte family also includes other figures linked to the arts and sciences. Astrée’s paternal great-grandfather is the neurologist and psychiatrist Jean Lhermitte, and the lineage includes painter Léon Lhermitte as well as neurologist François Lhermitte. Artistic practice is therefore not a family break but rather a continuity over several generations.
Private life
Astrée is the mother of a daughter named Alice, born from her relationship with N. Soka, about whom very little is publicly known. This discretion regarding her personal sphere extends the general attitude of the Lhermitte family towards the media.
The journey of Astrée Lhermitte-Soka remains largely under-documented compared to its actual richness. Between experimental video, conceptual painting, and presence in the circuit of independent galleries, her work far exceeds the reductive label of “star child” that most search results attribute to her. The next group exhibition or projected installation may be the one that rebalances public perception.