Particia Boulay was born in Remirement, a small spot in Vogesen, on the 04.03.1957 as the daughter of Maryvonne Odette Boulay.

Against the declared will of her mother and her stepfather, who wanted her to worke in the nerby factory as soon as possible, she managed to take part in higher education by keeping on going to school. In 1977 she moved to Nancy to study economics.

Here, in the collegiate connections  of the seminars, shared living cliques and pubs, Patricia and Marthe meet for the first time. One is nineteen the other seventeen years old. ...

They discover together painting, make extensive journeys for example to southamerica and share intensive moements of an intoxicational atmosphere of departure, that marks this time of their lives. When Patricia, the braver one of the two, decides, after her succesfully finished foundation course in 1980, to enroll in the art accademy of Marseille and follow her passion, their ways of live split. A bit later Marthe leaves the homely region as well for the south, Montpellier, and starts to study arts. The following years are filled with shared experience in the two most lively metropoles of the south of France, the two young women want to live »intensive and right from the fullest of lives«. They have both the »claim« as well as the »will« to omit no experience, but take it all in: sex and love, the keep, more travels and especially trips to exhibitions and museums  from Venice to Paris. This is what dictates the rhythm of their friendship. ...

In the meantime during the three yearsParticia is forced to deal with backslides, because her forces of resitance can not keep up with the pressure of existence of the seaport. In the autumn of 1990 she decides to follow her boyfriend to his home in Germany and start from scratch.

The letters assambled in the book, document the beginning and the developement of this intention, which she describes to her formerly closest friend in great detail. She »is the only one« and also »far enough away«, to be able to stand such intimacy.

Only for the two last years of her live there is no equal correspondence to be found, this is probably because  their was to many turbulences to make room for writing. »The letters arrived irregularly, but I answerd them by letter or phone, but for those who were too convoluted and about ten pages long, written in a manic phase. I have always declined to take part in her delirium«, recounted Martha later through mail.

In the night or on the noon of the 21. of October 2000 Patricia Boulay commits suicde in her flat in Frankfurt. «The Patricia, whom I loved dearly and whom I trusted, has actually vanished a long time ago.«

Her artistic work have been made approchable by Thomas Wiederspahn and Anna Fasold:

www.blandine-solange.com