Theme: Enduring Folds
Participating artists: Nathalie Ampleman | Raymond Aubin | Renée Chevalier | Micheline Couture | Lillianne Daigle | Michèle DeBellefeuille | Madeline Deriaz | Maryse Des Aulniers | Cécile Dremière | Gracia Dubé | Élisabeth Dupond | Bruno Gervais | Louis Godbout | Jose Roberto Godoy | Olena Golub | Eugenia Gortchakova | John Graham | Adriana Gutiérrez | Saeko Hanji | Isao Kobayashi | Johanne Lafrenière | Louise Lamirande | Doris Lamontagne | Marie-Paule Le Bohec-Macot | Denis Leclerc | Kinichi Maki | Louise Mercure | Joseph Muscat | Thom O’Connor | Csaba Pál | André Paquin | Martine Périat | Henry Pouillon | Izabella Retkowska | Mana Rouholamini | Anne et Gilles Roulant et Guillaume | Jozina Marina Van Hees | Markéta Váradiová | Paul Walty | David Westrop | Pierre Woerner
Enduring Folds
The ancient Greeks have developed a whole grammar of the draped figure from the straight geometry of the archaic style to the lyrical passion of the Hellenic style. The formal archetypes they left for posterity have been taken up again and again like in the gothic column sculpture or the baroque angels of Bernini.
Will the modern era, through the famous Demoiselles d’Avignon by Picasso for instance, undermine the validity of the draped figure in art ? A considerable body of work is still being treated in actual art practices, from Michael Snow (Solar breath, Northern Caryatids, 2002) to Shirin Neshat (Rapture-Series — Women Scattered, 1999), from Christo and Jeanne-Claude (Runnig Fence, 1972-76) to Ed Pien and Johannes Zits (Gravity, 2012). The list goes on and on and includes a remarkable example pertaining to etching in the work of Betty Goodwin (Crushed Vests, 1969-74).
May they be political, social or formal, the draped figure seems to adapt itself to the numerous preoccupations of the artist as a subject, as a mean or simply as matter.
— François Chalifour, Curator